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THE 

YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

TOLD IN THE FORM OF 
AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY 



BY 



S. WEIR MITCHELL, M.D. 




NEW YORK 

THE CENTURY CO. 

1904 



LtBRAHV o' 0«N»RES< 

SEP 10 1904 
Otpynght Entiy 

CL/^8 tC XXe. No. 

corv * 






Copyright, 1904, by 
The Century Co. 



Published October, igo4 



THE OEVINNE PRES? 



TO 

JOHN S. BILLINGS 

IN GEATEFUL EEMEMBEANCE OF 

FOETY YEAES OF 

FEIENDSHIP 



THE 
YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 



" And if I have done well, and as is fitting the story, it is 
that which I desired : but if slenderly and meanly, it is that 
which I could attain unto."— 2 Maccabees xv. 38. 



THE 
YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

DIARY — NOVEMBER, 1797 



MY retirement from ofificial duties as 
President has enabled me to restore 
order on my plantations, and in some degree 
to repair the neglected buildings which are 
fallen to decay. The constant coming of 
guests— moved, I fear, more by curiosity 
than by other reasons— is diminished owing 
to snows, unusual at this period of the year. 
Owing to these favouring conditions, I 
have now some small leisure to reflect on 
a life which has been too much one of action 
and of public interests to admit, hitherto, of 
that kind of retrospection which is natural, 
and, as it seems to me, fitting in a man of my 
years, who has little to look forward to and 
much to look back upon. 



4 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

My recent uneasiness lest I should be 
called upon to conduct a war against our 
old allies, the French, is much abated, and 
I feel more free to consider my private 
affairs. I am too far advanced in the vale 
of life to bear much buffeting, and I have 
satisfaction in the belief we have escajDed 
a new war for which the nation has not yet 
the strength. For sure I am, if this coun- 
try is preserved in tranquillity twenty years 
longer, it may bid defiance in a just cause 
to any powers whatever, such in that time 
will be its power, wealth, and resources. 

Increasing infirmity and too frequent 
aches and ailments remind me that I am 
Hearing the awful moment when I must 
bid adieu to sublunary things, and appear 
before that Divine Being to whom alone 
my country owes the success with which we 
have been blessed. But the great Disposer 
of events is also the Being who has formed 
the instruments of his will and left them re- 
sponsible to the arbitration of conscience. 
Therefore I have of late spent much time in 
considering my past life, and how it might 
have been better or more successful, and in 
thankfulness that it has escaped many pit- 
falls. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 5 

My reflections have brought back to mind 
a remark which seems to me just, made by 
my aide, Colonel Tilghman, a man more 
given to philosophic reflection than I have 
been. He asked me if I did not think there 
was something providential in the way each 
period of my life had been an education for 
that which followed it. I said that this idea 
had at times presented itself to my mind, 
and when I betrayed curiosity, he went on 
to say that my very early education in self- 
reliance and my training as a surveyor of 
wild lands had fitted me for frontier war- 
fare, that this in turn had prepared me 
for action on a larger stage, and that 
all through the greater war my necessities 
called for constant dealing with political 
questions, and with men who were not sol- 
diers. He thought that this had in turn 
educated me for the position to which 
my countrymen summoned me at a later 
time. 

As I was silent for a little, this gentleman, 
who became my aide-de-camp in June, 1780, 
and for whom I conceived a warm and last- 
ing affection, thinking his remark might 
have been considered a liberty, said as much, 
excusing himself. 



6 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

I replied that, so far from annoying me, 
I found what he had to say interesting. 

When, recently, these remarks of Colo- 
nel Tilghman recurred to me, I felt tliat 
they were correct, and dwelling upon them 
at this remote time, my interest in the se- 
quence of the events of mj^ youthful life 
assumed an importance which has led me 
of late to endeavour, with the aid of ray 
diaries, to refresh my memories of a past 
which had long ceased to engage my at- 
tention. 

I remember writing once that any recol- 
lections of my later life, distinct from the 
general history of the war, would rather 
hurt my feelings than tickle my pride while 
I lived. I do not think vanity is a trait of 
my character. I would rather leave pos- 
terity to think and say what they please of 
me. Those who served with me in war and 
peace will be judged as we become sub- 
jects of history, and time may unfold more 
than prudence ought to disclose. Concern- 
ing this matter I wrote to Colonel Hum- 
phreys that if I had talent for what he 
desired me to do, I had not leisure to turn 
my thoughts to commentaries. Conscious- 
ness of a defective education, and want of 
leisure, I thought, unfitted me for such an 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 7 

undertaking. I did, however, answer cer- 
tain questions put to me by Colonel Hum- 
phreys concerning the Indian wars, but he 
has, so far, made no use of these notes. 

One of these considerations does not so 
much apply at present, for I possess the 
leisure, and in recording my early reminis- 
cences I shall do so for myself alone, and 
assuredly shall find no satisfaction in com- 
ments on the conduct of other officers who, 
like myself, were honestly engaged in learn- 
ing, and at the same time practising, a busi- 
ness in which none of us hcid a large 
experience. I shall confine my attention 
to recalling the events of my youth, and 
as I hate deception even where the imagi- 
nation only is concerned, I shall try, for 
my own satisfaction, to deal merely with 
facts. General Hamilton, whose remarks 
I have often just reason to remember, once 
wrote me that no man had ever written a 
true biography of himself, that he was apt 
to blame himself excessively or to be too 
much prone to self-defence. He went on 
to state that an autobiography was written 
either from vanity and to present the man 
favourably to posterity, or because he de- 
sired for his own pleasure in the study of 
himself to recall the events of his career. 



8 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

In the latter case there is no need of pub- 
lication. 

It is only in order to such self-examina- 
tion as that to which he refers that I am 
induced to set down the remembrances of 
my earlier days, and because writing of 
them will, I feel, enable me more surely to 
bring them back to mind. I have no other 
motive. 

Whatever just ambitions I have had have 
been fully gratified ; indeed, far beyond my 
wishes. The great Searcher of hearts is my 
witness that I have now no wish which 
aspires beyond the humble and happy lot 
of living and dying a private citizen on 
my own farm. In my estimation, more 
permanent and genuine happiness is to be 
found in the sequestered walks of connubial 
life, so long denied me in the war, than in 
the more tumultuous and imposing scenes 
of successful ambition. Nor can I complain. 
I am retiring here within myself. Envious 
of none, I am determined to be pleased with 
all; and with heartfelt satisfaction, feeling 
that my life has been on the whole happy, I 
will move gently down the stream until I 
sleep with my fathers. 

There are indeed not many circumstances 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 9 

in my life before tlie war which it now gives 
me pain to recall. I could not truthfully say 
this of that great contest, nor of the political 
struggles of my service as President. Mr. 
Adams, or perhaps Mr. Jefferson, once said 
of me that I was a man too sensitive to con- 
demnation. This I believe to be correct, but 
I have not discovered that my ability to de- 
cide was ever largely affected by either un- 
reasonable blame or the bribes of flattery. 

The treachery of men who professed for 
me friendship, and the intrigues of those 
who, like Conway, Lee, Gates, and Rush, 
used ignoble means to weaken my authority 
when it was of the utmost importance to our 
common cause that it should be strength- 
ened, were calculated to give pain chiefly 
because they lessened my usefulness. Nor 
am I ever willing to dwell upon the treason 
of Arnold, which cost me the most painful 
duty of the war, and lost to the country a 
great soldier, who had not the virtue to 
wait until, in the course of events, his ser- 
vices would obtain their reward. It is, how- 
ever, somewhat to be wondered at that in so 
long a war, where hope did at times seem 
to disappear, the catalogue of traitors was 
so small. It is strange that there were not 



10 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

more, for few men have virtue to withstand 
the highest bidder. As to ill-natured and 
unjust reflections on my conduct, I feel, and 
have felt, everything that hurts the sensi- 
bility of a gentleman, but to persevere in 
one's duty and be silent is the best answer 
to calumny. 

Dr. Franklin has wisely said that no 
examples are so useful to a man as those 
which his own conduct affords, and that 
he was right in his opinion I have reason 
to believe. This I have observed to be true 
of anger, to which I am, or was, subject. 
1 flatter myself that I have now learned to 
command my temper, although it is still on 
rare occasions likely to become mutinous. I 
do not observe that mere abuse ever troubles 
me long, but in the presence of cowardice 
or ingratitude I am subject to fits of rage. 

Arnold's treason distressed me, but the 
treachery of one of my cabinet, Edmund 
Randolph, the nephew and adopted son of 
my dear friend Peyton Randolph, disturbed 
my temper as nothing had done since the 
misconduct of Lee at Monmouth. If in any 
instance I was swayed by personal and pri- 
vate feelings in the exercise of official 
patronage and power, it was in the case of 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 11 

Mr. Randolph; and this fact added to the 
anger which his conduct excited. 

I willingly turn from the remembrance 
of ingratitude, a sin that my soul abhors. 
It is a severe tax which all must occasion- 
ally pay who are called to eminent stations 
of trust, not only to be held up as con- 
spicuous marks to the enmity of the public 
adversaries of their country, but to the 
malice of secret traitors, and the envious 
intrigues of false friends and factions. But 
all this is over. I willingly leave time and 
my country to pronounce the verdict of 
history. 

As I wrote what just now I have set down, 
a remark of Mr. John Adams came into my 
mind. He said it was difficult for a man to 
write about himself without feeling that he 
was all the time in the presence of an audi- 
ence. This may be true of Mr. Adams, but 
I am not aware that it is true of me. 

The statement I shall now record of 
myself and for myself might be made very 
full as to events by the use of the details 
of my diaries, but this I desire to avoid. My 
intention is to deal chiefly with my own 
youthful life and the influences which af- 
fected it for good or for ill. 



II 



BEING without children to transmit my 
name, I have taken no great interest in 
learning much about my ancestors. I have, 
indeed, been too much concerned with larger 
matters. It is, however, far from my design 
to believe that heraldrj^, coat-armour, etc., 
might not be rendered conducive to public 
and private uses with us, or that they can 
have any tendency unfriendly to the purest 
spirit of republicanism ; nor does it seem to 
me that pride in being come of gentry and 
of dutiful and upright men is without its 
value, if we draw from an honourable past 
nourishment to sustain us in continuing to 
be what our forefathers were. This also 
should make men who have children the 
more careful as to their own manner of life, 
and as for myself, although denied this 
great blessing, I may perhaps wisely have 
been destined to feel that all my country- 
men were to me something more than my 
fellow-citizens. 

12 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 13 

I have heard my half-brother Lawrence 
say that he had learned from his elders 
that my English ancestors were violent 
Ivoyalists, especially one Sir Henry Wash- 
ington, when the great struggle arose be- 
tween the Parliament and the King in the 
time of the Commonwealth. 

I recall that, when a young man, I was 
riding with my friend George Mason, and 
when this matter arose, and he asked me 
whether if I had lived in those days I should 
have been for the crown or the commons, I 
replied that if I had lived in that time I 
could have answered him, but that I was not 
enough informed concerning that period to 
be able to state on which side I should have 
been. Certainly I should have found it hard 
to make war on the King. 

I profess myself to be ignorant as to 
much that concerns my ancestry. When too 
young to have the smallest interest in the 
matter, I heard my two half-brothers and 
AVilliam Fairfax conversing on the subject 
of the origin of my family. The brothers 
were not very clear as to our descent, but 
were of opinion that we came of the Wash- 
ingtons of Sulgrave, originally of Lanca- 
shire. In 1791 the Garter king-at-arms, Sir 



14 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

Isaac Heard, wrote to me, sending a pedi- 
gree of my family; but I had to confess it 
was a subject to wliicli I had given very lit- 
tle attention ; in fact, except as to our later 
history, I could only say that we came from 
Lancashire, Yorkshire, or some still more 
northerly county. 

Most of the early colonists of all classes 
were too busy in fighting Indians and rais- 
ing the means of living to concern them- 
selves with the relatives left in England. 
This indifference was not uncommon among 
us, and was in those early days to be ex- 
pected. It explains why we and other de- 
scendants of settlers knew, and indeed 
cared, too little about our ancestors. 

I do not know what exactly was the sta- 
tion of the father of the brothers who first 
came over — John, my ancestor, and Law- 
rence, his brother. It is of more moment 
to me to know that my forefathers in this 
country have been gentlemen, and have in 
many positions of trust, both in civil employ 
and in the military line, served the colonies 
and, later, their country with faithfulness 
and honour. 

As concerns the question of ancestry and 
a man's judging of himself by that alone. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 15 

I am much of Colonel Tilgbman's opinion, 

who once said to me, speaking of Mr. B , 

that when a man had to look back upon his 
ancestors to make himself sure he was a gen- 
tleman, he was but a poor sort of man, which 
I conceive to be true. 

My great-grandfather, John Washington, 
the first emigrant of our name, was the son 
of Lawrence and Amphilis, his wife. He 
went first to the Barbados, but, not being 
pleased, came later to Virginia; that is, in 
1657. 

It is certain that my great-grandfather 
in some respects possessed qualities which 
resembled those which I myself possess. 
He was a man of great personal strength, 
inclined to war, very resolute, and of a mas- 
terful and very violent temper. He was 
accused in 1675 of too severe treatment of 
the Indians in the frontier wars against the 
Susquehannocks, for which he was repri- 
manded by Sir William Berkeley, but, it is 
said, unjustly. He was a man had in es- 
teem and most respectable, and held a seat 
in the Assembly in 1670. He was also of a 
nature greatly moved by injustice, for on his 
voyage to Virginia a poor woman on board 
the ship was hanged for a witch, and he 



16 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

made great efforts, on being come ashore, to 
have the master and crew punished. I find 
in myself the same anger at injustice. 

It is proper to add that there was current 
in the colony a story that, on account of 
his rigour with the Indians, he was called 
by them Conocatorius, which, Englished, 
means a Destroyer of Villages. The Half- 
King, an Indian chief so called, hearing my 
name when first we met, addressed me by 
this title. There must have been among 
these tribes a remembrance or tradition as 
to the name, for certainly I never deserved 
it, and that after so long a time it should 
have been remembered appears to me 
strange. 

My great-grandfather's brother Law- 
rence was engaged for a time in the mer- 
cantile way, and at one time signed himself 
as of Luton, County Bradford, merchant. 
He made some voyages to Virginia and 
home again before he settled in the colony, 
and may have acquired land in England, 
for, as I shall state later, he devised real 
estate in the home country. 

As I speak of the home country, T am 
reminded that even after the War of Inde- 
pendency the habit of speaking of England 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 17 

as liome prevailed with many, so strong 
was the attachment to the mother country; 
and, indeed, nothing but the folly of Great 
Britain could have broken the bonds which 
united us. 

My great-grandfather, John Washing- 
ton, brought with him a wife from England. 
Her maiden name I do not know. She and 
her two children died within a few years 
of his landing. The brothers mention in 
their wills property in England, but where 
or exactly what it was they do not say. It 
would seem, therefore, that it was not pov- 
erty which drove my ancestor to emigrate. 
That this property was not mere money, 
the proceeds of tobacco, appears to be 
shown by the will of my great-grandfather's 
brother Lawrence, who devised to Mary, his 
daughter, his whole estate in England, real 
as well as personal. 

My great-grandfather married secondly 
the widow of Walter Broadhurst, daughter 
of Nathaniel Pope of Appomattocks, gen- 
tleman. My grandfather Lawrence was the 
first born of this marriage. My great- 
grandfather died in 1677. He was of that 
importance as to have named for him the 
parish in which he resided. The brothers 



18 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

were not the only ones of the name who 
came to Virginia. There was also a cousin, 
Martha Washington. She emigrated to Vir- 
ginia and married Nicholas Hayward of 
Westmoreland. How it was that, being a 
spinster, she came over alone, I am not in- 
formed. She left her property to her cou- 
sins John and Lawrence, and a gold twenty- 
shilling piece to each, and to their sons 
each a feather bed and furniture, and to 
their heirs forever— which does appear to 
me long for a bed to last. 

There were also others, but if related I 
have not felt concerned to inquire. They 
spelled the name Vysington in certain 
deeds, which I have heard was the ancient 
manner of spelling it. Of them I know 
nothing further. My great-grandfather left 
a legacy to the rector of the lower church of 
Washington parish, and ordered that a fu- 
neral sermon be preached, which appears to 
me, as Lord Fairfax said, to be a certain 
way to secure being well spoken of, at least 
once, after death. He also provided in his 
will for a tablet of the Ten Commandments, 
and also the king's arms, to be set up in the 
church of his parish. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 19 

He may have been led to come to Vir- 
ginia by the fact that it had become for 
men loyal to the crown and to the Church 
of England a refuge such as the Puritans 
sought in Massachusetts. We have ever 
since been connected with that Church, nor 
have I found reason to depart from it. At 
times I have been a vestryman, but this was 
in those days also a civil office, having judi- 
cial duties, such as charge of the schools and 
of the poor of the parish. 

My connection with the Church of my 
fathers has varied in interest from time to 
time, for, although I have at times partaken 
of the sacrament and even fasted, I have 
not always felt so inclined, although I have 
with reasonable punctuality attended upon 
the services. I have had all my life a dis- 
inclination to converse on this subject, and 
confess, as Dr. Franklin once remarked to 
me, that "silence is sometimes wisdom as 
concerns a man's creed." 

In considering so much of my family his- 
tory as is known to me, I perceive that men 
married at an early age and remained no 
long time widowers. Also I observe that 
many children died young, as was like 



20 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

enough to happen on plantations remote 
from physicians, and indeed these were few 
in number and not as good as in the north- 
ern colonies. 

I know less of my grandfather Lawrence 
than of his father. He did not increase the 
importance of the family, neither was he 
inclined to public business. He was, as I 
have understood, a quiet, thrifty man, and 
no seeker of adventure by land or water. 
He married Mildred Warner, by whom he 
had children, and died leaving a competent 
estate, but none to be compared with the 
great lands accumulated by the Byrds or 
Carters. 

I conceive him to have been a person of 
moderate opinions concerning the Church 
of England, and as one who may have con- 
sidered the dissenting sects as ill used. This 
I gather from a book given to me three 
years ago by a gentleman of Philadelphia, 
of the Society of Friends, who would have 
had me to believe that my grandfather was 
of that sect. This book is the life of one 
John Fothergill, a Quaker preacher, who 
says that in 1720 he "held a meeting at Mat- 
tocks, at Justice Washington's, a friendly 
man, where the Love of God opened my 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 21 

heart toward the people, much to my com- 
fort and their satisfaction." I do not sup- 
pose it to have meant more than that, as the 
church could not be used by a dissenter. Jus- 
tice Washington willingly gave the good 
man the use of his own house. 



Ill 



MY father, Augustine, was born in 1694, 
on the plantation known as Wake- 
field, granted, in 1667, to his grandfather, 
and lying between Bridges' and Pope's 
creeks, in Westmoreland, on the north neck 
between the Potomac and the Rappahan- 
nock. My father, in his will, says: '' For- 
asmuch as my several children in this my 
will mentioned, being by several Ventures, 
cannot inherit from one another," etc. 

What he speaks of as his "Ventures" 
were his two marriages. A venture does ap- 
pear to me to be an appropriate name for 
the uncertain state of matrimony. The first 
"venture" was Jane Butler, who lies buried 
at Wakefield. Of her four children two 
survived— that is, my half-brothers Law- 
rence and Augustine, whom we called Aus- 
tin. I was the first child of my father's 
second "venture," and my mother was 
Mary Ball. I was born at Wakefield,^ on 

1 This estate was bought by my father from his 
brother John. 

22 



.THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 23 

February 11 [0. S.], 1732, about ten in the 
morning. I was baptized in the Pope's 
Creek church, and had two godfathers and 
one godmother, Mildred Gregory. Mr. 
Beverly WTiiting and Mr. Christopher 
Brooks were my godfathers. I do not re- 
call ever seeing Mr. Whiting, although his 
son, of the same name, I met in after years. 
Of Mr, Brooks I know nothing, nor do I 
know which one of the two gave me the 
silver cups which it was then the custom for 
the godfather to give to the godson. I still 
have them. I was told by a silversmith in 
Philadelphia that the cups are of Irish 
make, and of about 1720. There were six of 
these mugs, in order to be used for punch 
when the child grew up. 

The Balls were respectable, and came 
out first as merchants. My maternal grand- 
mother we know to have been Mary John- 
son, of English birth, but of her family 
nothing more. At a later time the older 
planter families, both with us and in the 
West Indies, paid more attention to their 
ancestry, sometimes, it is to be feared, with 
pretensions which had no just foundation. 

Many assumed arms to which they were 
not entitled, or, like Mr. J n, commis- 



24 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

sioned an agent in London to purchase 
some heraldic device, having Mr. Sterne's 
word for it that ''a coat of arms may be 
purchased as cheap as any other coat." 

I have had some reason to believe that 
our friends did not regard my mother's 
family, being in the mercantile line, as on 
the same social level as our own. But, in 
fact, we ourselves were not until a later 
day considered as of the highest class of 
Virginia gentry. Why this was I do not 
fully know. It is certain, however, that 
nowhere were aristocratic pretensions and 
the distinctions of social rank more marked 
than in Virginia. For a long time families 
like the Lees, Byrds, Carys, Masons, etc., 
regarded themselves as superior to other 
planter families, of as good or better 
blood. 

The lines of social rank among us I judge 
to have been made early to depend on extent 
of landed property, so that the owners of 
these vast estates were like great nabobs, 
and by having seats and control in the gov- 
ernor's council and the House of Burgesses 
obtained large influence. They were at 
pains to defend their pretensions by a law 
of primogeniture, which made entails so 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 25 

strict that they could not be broken, as in 
England, by agreement of father and son, 
but required to break them, in each case, an 
act of the Assembly. Families like our own 
were regarded rather as minor gentry, and 
were, for a time, owing in a measure to their 
having but moderate estates, looked down 
upon by certain of the great proprietors 
of enormous plantations and numberless 
slaves. 

Whatever may have been the reason, or 
the reasons, I was more than once made to 
feel the fact that I was not looked upon 
as an equal by certain of these gentlemen, 
and this at an age when men are sensitive 
to such considerations. 

My father, Augustine, has been described 
as a good planter and a man of energj^ I 
apprehend that he was of a serious tendency, 
for Lawrence, my brother, once gave me to 
understand that most of the few books at 
Wakefield were religious; but whether this 
was so or not I do not know. Like some of 
the rest of us, my father had a high and 
quick temper, which, as he used to say, he 
had to keep muzzled. I remember being ter- 
rified at seeing him in a storm of anger 
because the clergyman who was to have bap- 



26 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

tized my sister Mildred was too much in 
liquor to perform the ceremony. 

About the year 1724 he became inter- 
ested in the mining of iron ore with the 
Principio Company, in which the venturers 
were chiefly English. A furnace was opened 
on his estate in Stafford County. It was 
confiscated in 1780 as rebel property. He 
had a contract for hauling the ore from the 
mines, and later commanded a ship for the 
taking of iron to England and the fetching 
back of convict labourers. On this account, 
I apprehend, he was known as Captain 
Washington. He was, I have understood, a 
man of enterprising nature and better in- 
formed than most planters of his time. 

He was educated at Appleby in England, 
near Whitehaven. I have often regretted 
that I never had his opportunities, or those 
of my brothers, in the way of education. 
The fact of my being a younger son and my 
father's death, and also my mother's over- 
fondness, may have stood in the way, and on 
this and other occasions interfered with ray 
own plans or with those of others for me. 

I did not take after my mother in ap- 
pearance, and T had the large frame and 
strength of my father. In other respects 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 27 

also I was somewhat like him in my mind 
and character. 

When in later years I returned to visit 
Wakefield I used to fancy I remembered 
it. This I could not have done, as I was 
only three years old when, because of the 
unhealthfulness of the place, my father 
moved away. The house was burned down 
on Christmas eve, 1779. It was of wood, 
with brick foundations, and had eight bed- 
rooms. There was an underground dairy, 
a great garden with fig-trees and other fruit, 
and along the shores were wild flowering 
grapes and laurel and honeysuckle and 
sweetbrier roses, very fragrant in the spring 
season. Here in the middle of a great field 
lie my ancestors and some of the children of 
my father's first marriage. 

In the year 1735 we moved, as I have 
said, fifty miles higher up the Potomac to 
the estate then known as Epsewasson or 
Hunting Creek. This was given, with other 
land, by the colony to my great-grandfather 
and Colonel Spencer for importing an hun- 
dred labourers, and was bought by my fa- 
ther in 1726 from my aunt Mildred Gregory, 
later my godmother. It came afterwards to 
be called Mount Vernon. It was at that time 



28 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

in Prince "William County, which my father 
represented in the House of Burgesses, as 
my brother did later. There we remained 
until 1739. 

In this year our house took fire, as was 
supposed, by the act of one of our slaves, but 
never surely ascertained. We were then 
obliged to remove, and this time settled in 
Stafford, formerly St. George, on the east 
bank of the Rappahannock, opposite to 
Fredericksburg. 

This residence was a two-story house on 
a rise of ground, with a fertile meadow 
sloping gently to the river. It was built of 
wood and painted red. There, as people 
well-to-do, we lived until my father's death, 
when the division of his estate did some- 
what lessen the easiness of our lives; and 
of these latter years I can recall some more 
or less distinct remembrances, for here my 
education began. 



IV 



WHILE I was a child, my fatlier, as I 
have said, made many voyages to 
England and fetched back with him con- 
victs, and perhaps also indentured servants. 
Often in those days some of the unfortunate 
people thus sent to the colonies were under 
sentence for political offences, but many, of 
course, for crimes. One of these, a convict 
I was told, was my first schoolmaster. We 
called him Hobby, which was, I believe, 
a nickname; but he was named Grove, and 
was sexton of the Ealmouth church, two 
miles away. Of what our sexton school- 
master had been convicted I never heard, 
but of this I am assured, that my father 
would not have used as a schoolmaster a 
common thief. I used to ride the two miles 
to the ''field-school," as they called it, in 
front of a slave named Peter, and later was 
allowed a pony, to my mother 's alarm when 
he would tumble me off, as happened now 

29 



30 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

and then. Hobby was a short man, with one 
eye, and too good-humoured or too timid to 
be a good teacher, even of the a-b-c's and 
the little else we learned. 

My father was kind to this man, and per- 
haps knew his history. He would even have 
allowed him the use of the rod, with the aid 
of which I might have profited more largely, 
for I am of his opinion that children should 
be strictly brought up. Hobby, being of a 
humourous turn, seems to me, as I remember 
him, to have resembled the grave-digger in 
the play of "Hamlet." He sometimes 
amused and at other times terrified us by 
tales of London or of his recent life as a sex- 
ton. He believed many of the negro super- 
stitions—as that if a snake's head was cut 
off the tail would live until it thundered— 
and was much afraid of having what he 
called black magic put upon him by the 
negroes. 

I did not learn much from Hobby and 
preferred to be out of doors. My father 
considered, I believe, that, as I was a 
younger son and must in some way support 
mj^self, I should be well trained in both 
mind and body, and had he lived the chance 
of the former might have been bettered. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 31 

The latter was often made difficult by my 
mother, who was unhappy when I was sub- 
ject to the risks to which all lads of spirit 
are exposed. I remember that, when later 
my father wa^ teaching me to leap my pony, 
the pony refused over and over, and this 
being near to the house, my mother ran out, 
and at last had a kind of hysterick turn. My 
father sat still on a big stallion and took no 
notice of her entreaties. At last I got the 
pony over, and he fell with me. I jumped 
up and was in the saddle in a moment. My 
father said that was ill ridden, I must try it 
again; and upon this my mother ran back 
to the house, crying out I would be mur- 
dered. But my father was this manner of 
man ; he hated defeat, while my mother was 
ever desirous of keeping me out of danger, 
because it made her uncomfortable ; and this 
was strange, for I have never been able to 
see that she was greatly pleased when I Avas 
successful, or was much moved by what the 
great Master allowed me to attain in later 
years. 

My elder brothers, Lawrence and Augus- 
tine, were both at different times sent to 
England for education at Appleby School, 
near Whitehaven, when I was a child. Law- 



32 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

rence had the family liking for enterprises 
and martial emplojTnent. I was eight years 
old, and he of age, when Lawrence served 
with Admiral Vernon and General Went- 
wortli in the disastrous attack on Carta- 
gena. I remember as a boy the interest this 
expedition caused in our neighbourhood. It 
was said that Harry Beverley and other 
Virginians captured by the Spaniards had 
been made to work as slaves, and this 
stirred up much feeling among us. The ex- 
Governor Spottiswood, although an aged 
man, would have gone as a major-general, 
but died suddenly at Temple Farm, near 
Yorktown, where forty-two years later Lord 
Cornwallis met me to sign the capitula- 
tions. 

Lawrence was away two years. The let- 
ters wrote by him to my father were full 
of interest, and, as I remember, were the 
means of arousing in me, who was but a 
little lad, the liking for warfare, of which 
we all had a share. 

I can remember how, as we sat about the 
hearth at evening, my father read aloud 
to us these letters, and explained to me the 
military terms used, and why, for want of 
foresight, the gallantry of soldiers and sail- 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 33 

ors served only to give oiDportunity for loss 
of life. This was especially in connection 
with the last letter we received, after the dis- 
mal failure of the attack on Cartagena. He 
wrote : 

Honoured and dear Father : What with dis- 
sensions between the General "Wentworth and 
Admiral Vernon, who was, as we think, not to 
blame, we have come away, leaving the Spaniards 
to crow, and our Colonel Gooch ill at Jamaica. 
When I am to have another dose of glory I pray 
to have better doctors. 

We were to storm Fort Lazaro — which must 
mean Lazarus— at night. But we were too long 
getting there, or the guides treacherous, and the 
ladders too short and no sufficient breach. This 
Lazarus fort was too much alive, but we were ac- 
tually on the rampart when Colonel Grant was 
killed, and we were driven back in sad confusion, 
and half of us, a good thousand, killed or wounded 
for want of forethought. I came off with no more 
hurt than to be so spent that I had no breath 
to curse the folly for which so many brave men 
died. The climate was worse than the dons, and 
we took ship with our tails between our legs and 
some two thousand shaking with agues and racked 
with fever. 

When I heard this I jumped up and said 
I wished I could have been there, upon 



34 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

which my father laughed and said I was 
better off where I was, and my mother that 
I had better go to bed. 

I was at that age when lads of spirit are 
apt to ask questions, and concerning these 
my father was always patient, and encour- 
aged a reasonable curiosity; but, on the 
other hand, my mother disliked this habit of 
curiosity, and when my father talked of In- 
dian wars and of my brother's fine conduct 
at Cartagena she was sure to say I should 
never go to war. My father would reply 
that it was sometimes the business and also 
the duty of a gentleman, and then there was 
no greater pleasure than to hear over and 
over how Sir Henry Washington, said to be 
of our family, defended Worcester in the 
civil war in England. 

In those days all the world was at war, 
and with us there was always the dread of 
Indian outbreaks. It was no wonder that 
I and other little fellows at Hobby's school 
played at soldiering. A lad named William 
Bustle, a fat, sturdy boy, was commander 
of the Indians, and in the woods we imi- 
tated the red men and the frontier farmers, 
and passed from tree to tree throwing 
stones, or, in winter, snowballs, with mock 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 35 

scalping and much pulling of hair, which 
was worn long. This was interfered with 
one winter because Bustle hit me in the 
eye with a snowball in which was a stone, 
a thing not considered fair. My mother 
wished Bustle punished. My father said I 
must take care of my own quarrels, and 
this I did, for, being then ten years old, 
and very strong, as soon as I went back 
to school I gave Bustle a good beating. 
In fact, I was of unusual strength, and be- 
cause of my violence of temper felt no 
hurt, and would not listen when Bustle 
called, "Enough." My mother's uncertain 
discipline and her too affectionate weak- 
ness did me great harm. For if my father 
punished me on account of disobedience or 
outbursts of temper, my mother was sure 
to interfere, or to coddle and pity me, a 
thing I greatly disliked. I never learned 
much self-control until a later day, which, 
in its place, I shall call to mind. 

My sister Betty, who afterwards married 
Fielding Lewis, was, next to my half-brother 
Lawrence and my brother Jack, most dear 
to me. Samuel had some of the weaknesses 
of my mother, and Charles, in later days, 
some worse ones of his own. In after life 



36 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

Samuel was often in debt, and was married 
five times, being extravagant in this as in 
all other ways. Mildred was sadly affected 
from birth and died young. It was unfor- 
tunate for me that while I was a child my 
half-brothers were sent from home and put 
in charge of the plantations of Wakefield 
and of Mount Vernon, which had been re- 
built and given the name of the admiral 
whom Lawrence much admired. 



V 



IN" 1742 Lawrence came from Cartagena, 
and meant to continue in the service, 
but, after our sudden way, he fell in love 
with Anne, the daughter of William Fairfax 
of Belvoir, our neighbour, the cousin and 
agent of my lord of that name, and this, 
luckily for my own character, ended his 
desire for a military life. I too well recall 
the event which delayed his marriage. I 
was at this time, April 17, 1743, being 
eleven years old, on a visit to my cousins 
at Choptank, some thirty miles away. We 
were very merry at supper, when Peter, who 
was supposed to look after me, arrived with 
the news of my father's sudden illness. It 
was the first of my too many experiences of 
the ravage time brings to all men. I heard 
the news with a kind of awe, but without 
realizing how serious in many ways was 
this summons. I rode home behind Peter, 
and found my mother in a state of distrac- 

37 



38 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

tion. She led me to the bedside of my 
father, crying out, " He is dying." The 
children were around him, and he was 
groaning in great pain; but he kissed us 
in turn, and said to me, "Be good to your 
mother." I may say that throughout her 
life I have kept the promise I made him 
as I knelt, crying, at his bedside. He died 
that night, and I lost my best friend. 

My ^mother for a month talked of him 
incessantly, and after that very little, ex- 
cept to say, " If your father were alive I 
should be more considered." I do not 
know why I, too, was averse to speaking 
of him, and yet I loved him above all peo- 
ple. But concerning such matters children 
are jDuzzled, and unable to express them- 
selves, nor have I ever been other than shy 
in saying what I feel in the way of affec- 
tion, whereas on paper I do not suifer this 
shyness, nor feel the reserve which occa- 
sioned Colonel Trumbull to say to me 
once that I was often unjustly regarded 
as cold because of my difficulty of being 
outspoken concerning my regard for those 
dear to me. I am little better of it to-day. 

My father had much land and little 
money. As was usual in Virginia, he left to 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 39 

his elder sons the larger share. To Law- 
rence he gave his interest in the iron-works, 
with Mount Vernon and two thousand five 
hundred acres, also the resident slaves and 
the mill, and, in case of his failure to leave 
a child lawfully begotten or such child 
dying under age, this property was " to 
go to and remain" to me. To Augustine 
he left Wakefield; to me his farm on the 
Rappahannock and one moiety of his land 
on Deep Run, with ten negro slaves. Sam- 
uel, John, and Charles were also given land 
and slaves, and Betty four hundred pounds. 
My mother was to have my estate for 
her use until I was of age, and with what- 
ever else was left her, and her own sixteen 
hundred acres, might have sufficed with 
economy; but that virtue she found diffi- 
cult to practise, and was never a prudent 
or managing woman. She soon felt her 
children to be a heavy burden upon an 
estate which was none too large, and com- 
plained, as was common for her to do all 
her life, that she was poor, and this even 
when I was assured that she was comfort- 
ably cared for. I never knew a more af- 
fectionate mother. She was said to have 
been foolishly fond of her children, and I 



40 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

was more than once brought to feel that 
her love of us did interfere with good judg- 
ment. Certainly whatever were her opin- 
ions,— and we did not often agree,— these 
differences never lessened my love for her, 
as differences often do. As she grew old 
her peculiarities were more and more nota- 
ble. With very many good qualities, she 
was hard to satisfy, and this did not cease 
until the end of her life, for she could not 
be restrained from borrowing money and 
accepting gifts from those who were not 
her relations. Indeed, I once had to write 
her that while I had a shilling left she 
should never want, but that I must not be 
viewed as a delinquent, or be considered 
by the world as unjust and an undutiful 
son. But so was she made, and even her 
doctor, Thornton, wrote to me in her last 
illness, in which his cousin. Dr. Rush, was 
also consulted, that he '' had every day a 
small battle with her." 



VI 



MY father died in April, 1743, and Law- 
rence was married to Miss Fairfax 
in June of that year. It was fortunate for 
me that my brother's wife, Anne Fairfax, 
soon shared the constant affection felt for 
me by her husband Lawrence. 

Austin, as we usually called Augustine, 
also embarked into the matrimonial state 
as the husband of Anne Aylett of West- 
moreland, who brought him a large prop- 
erty. 

The next three years of my young life 
were important. I learned very soon from 
my mother that, when of age, I would have 
a moderate estate and insufficient. It is a 
happy thing that children have no power 
to realize what money means to their elders, 
else I might have been set against Law- 
rence and thought my father unjust. As 
I did not understand my mother's com- 
plaints of poverty, they had no effect upon 

41 



42 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

me. After my father's death, and in the ab- 
sence of my elder brothers, the house and 
farm soon showed the want of a man's 
care, and we lads enjoyed at this time al- 
most unlimited freedom. My older bro- 
thers saw it, and felt that I, at least, might 
suffer, being of an age and nature to need 
discipline and to be guided. In fact, I de- 
lighted to skip away from m^y man Peter, 
and find indulgence in roasting ears of In- 
dian corn in the forbidden cabins of the 
field-slaves, or in coon-hunts at night, when 
all the house was asleep. When my pranks 
were discovered my mother was sometimes 
too severe in her punishments, or else only 
laughed. 

Nothing was assured or certain in the 
house, now that the hand of wise and strong 
government was gone. 

We were taught the catechism as a prep- 
aration for Sundays, and my mother read 
the Bishop of Exeter's sermons or Matthew 
Hale's "Commentaries, Moral and Divine." 
I still have this book. It belonged origi- 
nally to my father's first wife, Jane Butler, 
and below her name my mother wrote her 
own, "Mary Ball." At this time she was 
much given to Puritanical views, which 



THE YOUTH OP WASHINGTON 43 

were beginning to be felt in Virginia, owing 
largely to the want of better clergymen in 
the Established Church. She would have 
the servants up late on Saturday to cook, 
that there might be no labour on Sunday. 
In consequence, the blacks fell asleep in 
church. My mother would then get up in 
mid-service, and go where they sat, and poke 
them awake with her fan. 

At this period my great personal strength 
and endurance were constant temptations 
to forbidden enterprises on land or water, 
and it was at this time of my life that I 
discovered a certain pleasure in danger. I 
find it difficult, not having the philosophi- 
cal turn of mind, to describe what I mean; 
but of this I became aware as time went on, 
that, in battle or other risks, I was suddenly 
the master of larger competence of mind 
and body than I possessed at other times. 

When, on one occasion, the learned Dr. 
Franklin desired to be excused if he asked 
whether in battle I had ever felt fear, I had 
to confess that in contemplating danger 
I was like most men, but that immediate 
peril had upon me the influence which liquor \ 
has upon some, making them feel able for 
anything. He said yes, but as to the influ- 



44 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

ence of drink, that was a mere delusion; 
whereas he understood, and here he begged 
to apologize, that, in great danger in battle 
and when the ranks were breaking, I had 
seemed to possess powers of decision and 
swift judgment beyond those I could ordi- 
narily command. I said it was true, that 
danger seemed to lift me in mind and body 
above my common level, and that it was the 
satisfaction this gave which made danger 
agreeable; not, be it said, the peril, but the 
results. 

I apprehend him to have been correct, 
for in battle I have often felt this, as at 
Monmouth, at Princeton, and elsewhere. 
In general, my mind acts slowly, and I have 
been often painfully aware of it when in 
council with General Hamilton, Mr. Jeffer- 
son, or General Knox. General Wayne was 
fortunate in this quickening of the mind in 
danger. He once said to Colonel Hum- 
phreys of my staif that he disliked danger, 
but liked its effects upon himself when it 
came. 

Certainly I had my share of risks at the 
time I now sjieak of. No one controlled 
my actions, and old Peter, in whom my 
father had greatly trusted, now allowed me, 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 45 

in general, to do as pleased me. The river 
and the forests afforded game, but the rid- 
ing of half-broken horses was what most I 
liked. My joy in the horse and his ways 
was the mere satisfaction in conquest and in 
the training of a strong brute ; but it made 
me a good horseman, and helped, though I 
knew it not then, to prepare me for the years 
when I was to be so much in the saddle. 

We had at this time a slave named Samp- 
son, who possessed great control over ani- 
mals. He was old in our service, and very 
black. He was said to be a Mandingo negro, 
and to do very well if kindly treated. The 
blacks of this tribe incline to take their own 
lives if what they feel to be disgrace falls 
upon them, and this man, for whom my fa- 
ther had a great liking, never had been 
whipped. He had charge, under the over- 
seer, of the stables, the brood-mares, and the 
training of horses for saddle or harness. 

I was at this time more about the stables 
than was allowed under my father's rule, 
and did, in fact, much as I liked out of 
school hours. It so happened that once, 
on a Saturday, there being no school, I 
was very early at the stables, and, as there 
was no one to hinder, made the groom 



46 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

saddle a liunter we bad. On this I made 
my appearance at a meet for fox-hunting, 
four miles from home, to the great amuse- 
ment of the gentry. They asked me if I 
could stay on, and if the horse knew he had 
any one on his back. However, the big sor- 
rel carried me well, and knew his business 
better than I did. I saw two foxes killed, 
and this was my first hunt; but as I rode 
home my horse went lame, and, to save him, 
I dismounted and led him. Towards noon, 
when we were come to the farm stable, I 
found the overseer, with a whip in his hand, 
swearing at Sampson, and making as if 
about to beat him. I ran up behind them 
and snatched away the whip. The overseer 
turned and, seeing me, said he meant to 
punish Sampson for letting me take a 
horse which was sold to go to AVilliamsburg. 
When he knew the horse was lame, he was 
still more angry; but I declared I was to 
blame, and no one else, and said he should 
first whip me. He said no more, except that 
my mother w^ould say what was to be done. 
I think he made no report of me, and cer- 
tainly my mother said nothing. When the 
overseer had walked away, the old servant 
thanked me, and said no one had ever struck 
him, and that it would be his death. This 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 47 

seemed strange to me, a boy, for the slaves 
were whipped like children, and thought as 
little of it. Sampson said to me that I was 
like my father, that when I was angry I be- 
came red and then pale, and that I must 
never get angry with a horse. 

After this interference Sampson took 
great pains with me and taught me many 
useful things about horses. Although I 
became a good horseman, I never had his 
strange gift of managing dogs or other 
creatures. Indeed, he was the only black 
man I ever saw who could handle bees, for 
these industrious little insects have a great 
enmity to negroes. 

All this happened in October, 1743, and 
was the means of making a useful change 
in my life and ways. At about this time 
my two brothers came together to visit us, 
in order to satisfy my mother's complaints 
that she was never so poor and, since my 
father died, was not ever considered. It 
seems that at this time she was, as she re- 
mained until death, a dissatisfied woman, 
although never without sufficient income. 
She was, I fear, born discontented, and 
could not help it; for happiness depends 
more on the internal frame of a person's 
mind than on the externals in this world. 



vn 

WHILE matters concerning the estate 
were being discussed, Lawrence soon 
discovered so much of my too great free- 
dom that he and my half-brother Augustine 
insisted that I go to live for a time with the 
latter, near to whose abode was a good 
school. My mother wept and protested, but 
at last agreed, with impatience, that I might 
go if I wished to do so. Of this Lawrence 
felt secure, for he had promised me a horse 
for myself and clothes to come from Lon- 
don, especially a red coat. I have always 
had a fancy for being well clothed ; and as I 
was less well dressed than other gentle- 
men's sons, the idea of a scarlet coat, and the 
promise of spurs when I had learned to ride 
better, settled my mind. I liked very well 
the great liberty I had, and to part with this 
and my playfellows I was not inclined ; but 
I felt, as a boy does, that I was being made 
of importance, which pleases mankind at all 

48 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 49 

times of life. I may say, also, that I was be- 
come more grave tlian most of my years, 
and was curious to see Williamsburg, where 
lived the king's governor, and something 
beyond our plantation. 

I remember that George Fairfax insisted 
once that no action ever grew out of only 
one motive, and, as I see, there were sev- 
eral made me willing to leave my home. 
Thus when Lawrence talked to me of his 
wars, and of his friends the Fairfaxes, and 
of how I must also soon visit him at Mount 
Vernon, I readily agreed to his wishes. It 
was hard to part with Betty, who looked 
like me until I had the smallpox, and with 
my dear brother Jack; but I was eager, as 
the day came, to see the outside world, and 
I rode away very content, on a gray mare 
with one black fore foot, beside Augustine, 
and my man Peter after us. 

It was a long ride across the neck and 
down to Pope's Creek on the Potomac, and 
I was a tired lad when we rode at evening 
up to the door of the house of Wakefield, 
where I was born eleven years before. 

Here began a new life for me. Anne 
Aylett, Mrs. Augustine Washington, was a 
kind woman, very orderly in her ways, and 



50 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

handsome. iVfter two days Peter was sent 
home, and I was allowed to ride alone to 
a Mr. Williams's school at Oak Grove, four 
miles away. 

I took very easily to arithmetic, and, 
later, to mathematic studies. I remember 
with what pleasure and pride I accompanied 
Mr. Williams when he went to survey some 
meadows on Bridges' Creek. To discover 
that what could be learned at school might 
be turned to use in setting out the bounds of 
land, gave me the utmost satisfaction. I 
have always had this predilection for such 
knowledge as can be put to practical uses, 
and was never weary of tramping after my 
teacher, which much surprised my sister-in- 
law. I took less readily to geography and 
history. Some effort was made (but this 
was later) to instruct me in the rudiments 
of Latin, but it was not kept up, and a 
phrase or two I found wrote later in a copy- 
book is all that remains to me of that 
tongue. 

I much regret that I never learned to 
spell very well or to write English with 
elegance. As the years went by, I improved 
as to both defects, through incessant care 
on my part and copying my letters over 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 51 

and over. Great skill in the use of language 
I have never possessed, but I have always 
been able to make my meaning so plain in 
what I wrote that no one could fail to un- 
derstand what I desired to make known. 

I have always been willing to confess 
my lack of early education, but notwith- 
standing have been better able to present my 
reasons on paper than by word of mouth. 
I am aware, as I have said, that, except in 
the chase or in battle, my mind moves 
slowly, but I am further satisfied that under 
peaceful circumstances my final capacity to 
judge and act is quite as good as that of men 
who, like General Hamilton, were my supe- 
riours in power to express themselves. I 
may add that I learned early to write a clear 
and very legible hand. As to spelling, my 
mother's was the worst I ever saw, and I 
believe King George was no better at it than 
I, his namesake. This just now reminds me 
that I may have been named after his grand- 
father, King George II, for George was not 
a family name, and, as we were very loyal 
people, it may have been so. 

It was usual in those days to give to 
children names long in use in a family. 
John, Augustine, and Lawrence, for males, 



52 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

were repeated among us, and Mildred and 
Harriott; but I never heard of a George 
AVashington before me, nor of any George 
in our descent, except my grandmother's 
grandfather, the Hon. George Reade of 
his Majesty's council in 1657. General 
Hamilton at one time interested himself in 
this matter, but I could make no satisfac- 
tory answer. I suppose my mother knew. 
I never thought to ask her. General Ham- 
ilton made merry over the idea of how much 
it would have gratified his present Majesty 
to have known of his grandfather being thus 
honoured. 

Indeed, it pleased Mr. Duane, when ma- 
ligning me, to call me Georgius Rex, but of 
this I apprehend that I have said enough. 
It is of no importance. 

Outside of my school, the life at Wake- 
field was well suited to a lad of spirit. 
There were thirty horses in the stables, and 
some of them well bred and had won races 
at Williamsburg. 

The waters of Pope's Creek, where the 
Potomac tides rush in at flood and out at 
ebb through a narrow outlet of the creek, 
were full of crabs, oysters, clams, and fish. 
One of the slaves, named Appleby after 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 53 

August's school, was engaged in the supply 
of fish, which the many negroes and the 
family needed. I think there were, at the 
least, seventy blacks. Being permitted to 
go on the water with Appleby, I found 
much satisfaction in sailing and rowing 
and the search for shell-fish. My brother 
August once surprised me by saying that 
some day the bottom of the Bay of Chesa- 
peake would be a richer mine, on account 
of the oysters, than my brother Lawrence's 
iron-mines, by which we all set great store. 
This may some day come to pass. The 
quantities of shad took in April and May 
were enough to feed an army, and what we 
did not eat went to feed the land. 

In the autumn I was sometimes allowed 
to sit with August in a wattled blind, be- 
hind brush, while at dawning of day he shot 
the ducks, geese, and swans which flew over 
the little islands of Pope's Creek in great 
flocks. 

I prospered in this hardy life and grew 
strong and able to endure, nor was it less 
good for me in other ways; for, although 
I cared very little for August 's fiddling, nor 
to hear Anne sing, nor for the books, of 
which there was a fair supply, I admired 



54 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

August SO much that I began, as some lads 
will do, to imitate his ways of doing things. 
And this was of use to me, for August was 
very courteous and mild-spoken to people 
of all classes, and much beloved by his 
slaves, to whom he was a gentle and consid- 
erate master. 

The country along the Potomac was well 
settled with families of gentry, and visits 
were made by rowboats, so that I found very 
soon boy companions, although Belvoir, 
where the Fairfaxes lived, and Mount Ver- 
non, rebuilt in 1742, being remote, were less 
frequently visited. 

The church at Oak Grove was the better 
attended, and few persons were presented 
or admonished for non-attendance, be- 
cause on Sunday, as many drove long dis- 
tances, provisions were brought, and in the 
oak grove near by, between services, there 
was a kind of picnic, very pleasant to the 
younger people. 



VIII 

SOON after going to live for a season at 
Wakefield with Augustine, I began to 
take myself more seriously than is common 
in boys of my age. I believe I have all my 
life been regarded as grave and reserved, 
although, in fact, a part of this was due to 
a certain shyness, which I never entirely 
overcame, and of which I have already 
written. My new schoolmaster, Mr. Wil- 
liams, gave me a book which I still have, 
and which here, and later at Mount Ver- 
non, was of use to me. It was called the 
" Youth's Companion." It contained re- 
ceipts, directions for conduct and manners, 
how to write letters, and, what most pleased 
me, methods of surveying land by Gunter's 
rule, and all manner of problems in arith- 
metic and mathematics, as well as methods 
of writing deeds and conveyances. Young 
as I was, it suited well the practical side of 
my nature; for how to do things, and the 

55 



\y 



56 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

doing of them so as to reach practical re- 
sults, have never ceased to please me. 

My mother's natural desire for my pres- 
ence wore out the patience of Augustine, 
and I was at last, after some months (but 
I do not remember exactly how long), sent 
back to her and to a school kept by the 
Rev. James Marye, a gentleman of Hugue- 
not descent, at Fredericksburg, and from 
whom I might have learned French. My 
father had been desirous, I know not why, 
that I should learn that language ; but this 
I never did, to my regret. I should have 
been saved some calumny, as I shall men- 
tion, and later also inconvenience, when I 
had to deal with French officers during the 
great war, I had then to make use of Mr. 
Duponceau and of Lieutenant-Colonel Hugh 
Wynne of my staff, but had been better 
served by G. W. had I known the French 
tongue, 

I was at this time about fourteen, and 
was, as I said, a rather grave lad. I was 
industrious as to what I liked, but fond of 
horses and the chase, and was big of my 
years, masterful, and of more than common 
bodily strength. 

I was not more unfortunate than most 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 57 

other young Virginians in regard to edu- 
cation. Governor Spottiswood, as I have 
heard, found no members of the ma- 
jority in the House who could spell cor- 
rectly or write so as to state clearly their 
grievances. There were persons, like the 
late Colonel Byrd, who were exceptions, but 
these were usually such as had been abroad. 
Patrick Henry, long after this time, ob- 
served to my sister that, even if we Virgin- 
ians had little education. Mother Wit was 
better than Mother Country, for the gen- 
tlemen who came back brought home more 
vices than virtues. In fact, this may have 
been my father's opinion; for, although he 
sent Lawrence and Augustine to the Ap- 
pleby School in England, he would not allow 
of any long residence in London, where, he 
said, ''men's manners are finished, but so, 
too, are their virtues." 

For a few months in the next year I spent 
about half of the time with my mother. 
While there I studied, as before, at the 
school kept by the Rev. Mr. Marye. The 
rest of the time was spent in the company 
of Lawrence and his lady at Mount Vernon. 

Lawrence was a tall man, narrow-chested, 
and less vigorous than Augustine. He was, 



58 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

however, fond of the chase and fox-hunting, 
and had books in larger number than was 
usual among planters. I remember him as 
very pleasing in his ways, and possessed of 
a certain reserve and gravity of demeanour, 
which, as my sister Betty Lewis remarked, 
made his rare expressions of affection more 
valuable. 

He seemed to me the finest gentleman 
I ever knew, and I took to imitating him as 
my model, as I had done Augustine, which 
was at times matter for mirth to Anne, his 
wife. No doubt it seemed ridiculous, but it 
was, I do believe, of use to me. 

As I write, I recall with unceasing grati- 
tude the great debt I owe to my brother's 
care of me at this period of my life. I was 
encouraged when I was at Mount Vernon— 
as I was then for a time away from school 
— to keep up my studies, and I remember 
that I fell again with satisfaction upon the 
manual I just now spoke of. It is still in my 
possession, and my wife's children once 
made themselves uncommon merry over the 
ill-made pictures I drew on the blank pages ; 
but it was of use to me as no other book ever 
was. 

I was early made to understand that I 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 59 

must do something to support myself. The 
few acres on the river Rappahannock were 
not to be mine until I became of age, and 
until then were my mother 's ; indeed, I never 
took them from her. My brother disap- 
proved of the easy, loose life of the younger 
sons of planters, and, of course, trade was 
not to be considered, nor to work as a clerk ; 
and yet, without care, accuracy, and such 
business capacity as is needed by merchants, 
no man can hope to be successful, either as 
a planter or even in warfare. 

Ever since I had been at Mr. Williams's 
school, I had a liking for the surveying of 
land, and had later been allowed to further 
inform myself by attending upon Mr. Genn, 
the official surveyor of Westmoreland, a 
man very honest and most accurate. In- 
deed, I had so well learned this business that 
I became, to my great joy, of use to Law- 
rence and some of his neighbours, especially 
to William Fairfax, who had at first much 
doubt as to how far my skill might be 
trusted. 

Meanwhile various occupations for me 
were considered and discussed by my elders. 
The sea was less favoured in Virginia than 
at the North; but many captains of mer- 



60 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

chant ships were in those days, like my fa- 
ther, of the better class, and my brothers, 
who saw in me no great promise, believed 
that if I went to sea as a sailor I might be 
helped in time to a shijD, and have my share 
in the jorosperous London trade. 

Like many boys, I inclined to this life. 
I remind myself of it here because it has 
been said that I was intended at this time 
to serve the king as a midshipman, which 
was never the case. Meanwhile, — for this 
was an affair long talked about,— my mo- 
ther's brother, Joseph Ball, wrote to her 
from London, May 19, 1746, that the sea 
was a dog's life, and, unless a lad had great 
influence, was a poor affair, and the navy 
no better. Upon this my mother wrote, 
offering various trifling objections, and at 
last hurried to Mount Vernon, and so pre- 
vailed by her tears that my small chest was 
brought back to land from a ship in the 
river. 

My brother Lawrence comforted me in 
my disappointment, sajdng there were many 
roads in life, and that only one had been 
barred. I remember that I burst into tears, 
when once I was alone, and rushed off to 
the stables and got a horse, and rode away 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 61 

at a great pace. This has always done me 
good, and, somehow, settled my mind; for 
I have never felt, as I believe a Latin writer 
said, that care sits behind a horseman. I 
jolted mine off, but for days would not have 
any one talk to me of the matter. Even as 
a lad, I had unwillingness to recur to a 
thing when once it was concluded, and that 
is so to this day. 



IX 



THE summer passed away in sport and 
in visits to William Fairfax, who lived 
below us on the river. Here I saw much 
good society, among others the Masons, 
Carys, and Lees, and formed an attachment 
to William Fairfax, the master of Belvoir, 
and his son George, which was never broken, 
although we came long after to differ in 
regard to our political views. But of this, 
and of his cousin. Lord Fairfax, more here- 
after. In the fall of this year I returned 
to my mother, or rather, as before, I went 
to board across the Rappahannock at Fred- 
ericksburg, in the house of a widow of the 
name of Stevenson, which she pronounced 
Stinson. She had, by her two marriages, six 
sons, two of them Crawfords and four Ste- 
vensons. They were all well-grown fellows, 
and of great strength and bigness. 

I am reminded, as I set down in a ran- 
dom way what interests me, that, as I ex- 
pected, this act of attention brings to mind 

62 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 63 

some things which I seemed to have alto- 
gether forgotten. Among them is this, that, 
just before returning to my school, I went 
with Lawrence to pay my respects to Lord 
Fairfax, who was come for a visit to his 
cousin at Belvoir. We found the family, 
however, in sudden distress at the news, 
just arrived, of the death in battle of 
Thomas, the second son, who was killed in 
the Indies, in an engagement on board his 
Majesty's ship Harwich. We made, on this 
account, but a short stay. I remember that, 
as we rode away, Lawrence said to me : " A 
great preacher called Jeremy Taylor wrote 
a sermon about death, and gave a long list 
of the many ways of dying. Which way, 
George, would you wish to die? " I said I 
did not wish to die at all. 

Lawrence said: "But you will die some 
day. What way would you choose ! " I said 
I thought to die in battle would be best, 
and I said this because I remembered with 
horror watching how my father died and 
how greatly he suffered. 

Lawrence said: "The good preacher did 
not speak of that way to die." Now, as I 
write, being in years, it seems that not in 
that way shall I die, nor does it matter. 



64 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

After this I went back to my mother, or 
rather to the town of Fredericksburg. I 
liked it the more because Colonel Harry- 
Willis lived there. He married first my 
aunt Mildred, and second my cousin Mil- 
dred, so that I had about me many cousins, 
with also AVarners and Thorntons of my 
kindred. 

I was here fortunate in my teacher, of 
whom I have spoken before. This gentle- 
man, the Rev. James Marye, was very dif- 
ferent in his ways from some of the clergy 
put upon us by the Bishop of London, hard- 
drinking, ill-mannered men. Mr. Marye 
was got for St. George's parish, on a peti- 
tion of the vestry to Governor Gooch, He 
was rector thirty years, and was succeeded 
by his son. 

On Sunday, as was quite common in Vir- 
ginia, the girls and boys were heard the 
catechism by the rector, and those who did 
well were rewarded from time to time— 
the girls with pincushions and the boys with 
trap-balls. 

The sons of the widow in whose house 
I lodged during the week were, as I have 
said, rough, big fellows who damaged a 
great deal the pride I had in my strength, 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 65 

because among them, for the first time as 
concerned lads of near my years, I met my 
match in wrestling and jumping, and what 
we called the Indian hug. Almost all of 
them served under me in the war, and one, 
William Crawford, rose to be a colonel and 
perished miserably, being burned at San- 
dusky in the war with the Indians, after 
their cruel way. 

The Rev. Mr. Marye concerned himself 
more than the ordinary schoolmaster with 
the manners of his scholars. I may have 
been inclined beyond most lads to value his 
rules of courtesy and decent behaviour, for 
I kept the book in which I was made to copy 
the one hundred and eighteen precepts he 
taught us. I conceive them to have been of 
service to me and to others. I find the mice 
have gnawed and eaten a part of these rules. 
When, of late, I showed them to my sister 
Betty, she said she hoped eating of them 
would make the mice polite, for she was 
dreadfully afraid of those little vermin. 

In this manner my next two years passed 
by. During this time I became still further 
attracted by the exactness and interest of 
the surveying of land, which I carried on 
without present thought of gain. I used to 



66 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

ride into the woods, and, leaving my horse 
tied, make use of Peter as a chain-bearer. 
Sometimes my cousins went with me, espe- 
cially Lewis Willis, my schoolmate. But 
they soon grew tired and went to bird- 
nesting, or digging up of woodchucks, or to 
making the "praying-mantis" bugs fight 
one another. I never had much inclination 
towards games which had no distinct or last- 
ing result. At any time I preferred for ray 
play to fish or shoot, when allowed, or to 
measure lands and plot them. 

Any work demanding strict method is 
good for a lad, and I found in surveys an 
education of value and one suited to my 
tastes, which never very much inclined to 
discover happiness in constant intercourse 
with my fellow-men, nor in much reading 
of books. 



X 



AT the age of fifteen, in the fall of 1747, 
-XjL I went once more, for a time, to reside 
with Lawrence at Mount Vernon, where it 
was to be finally determined what I should 
do for a livelihood. As I look back on this 
period of my life, I perceive that it was the 
occasion of many changes. I saw much 
more of George William Fairfax and 
George Mason, ever since my friends, and 
was often with George's father, the master 
of Belvoir, only four miles from Mount 
Vernon. 

There , came often, for long visits, Wil- 
liam 's cousin. Lord Fairfax, over whose 
great estates in the valley William was the 
agent. I learned later that when first his 
lordship saw me he pronounced me to be 
a too sober little prig— and this, no doubt, 
I was; but after a time, when he came to 
overcome my shyness, he began to show 
such interest in me as flattered my pride 

67 



68 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

and pleased my brother Lawrence. At this 
period Lord Fairfax was a tall man and 
gaunt, very ruddy and near-sighted. 

It was natural that as a lad I should be 
pleased by the notice this gentleman, the 
only nobleman I had ever seen, began to 
take of me. My fondness for surveying he 
took more seriously than did my own peo- 
ple, and told me once it was a noble business, 
because it had to be truthful, and because 
it kept a man away from men and, espe- 
cially, from women. I did not then under- 
stand what he meant, and did not think it 
proper to inquire. 

I owed to this gentleman opportunities 
which led on to others, and to no one else 
have I been more indebted. I trust and 
believe that I let go no chance in after life 
to serve this admirable family. 

True friendship is a plant of slow growth, 
and must undergo and withstand the shocks 
of adversity before it is entitled to the ap- 
pellation. In fact, much disaster has be- 
fallen these friends, from whom politics and 
distance have separated me without weak- 
ening my gratitude or affection. 

It has often happened to me to learn that 
I am thought to be a cold man, but this I 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 69 

believe to be untrue; for though I am, as 
concerns social intercourse and freedom of 
speech, a man reserved by nature, I discover 
in myself a great freedom to express myself 
affectionately on paper— nor do I conceive 
that I am unlike others in feeling the loss of 
the many friends whom distance or death 
has separated from me. But I will not re- 
pine ; I have had my day. 

As my brother was aware of the advan- 
tage it might be to me to secure the good 
will of the Fairfaxes, I was encouraged to 
visit Belvoir often, and thus was given me 
the chance to be, when he chose, in the 
company of his lordship, who was at this 
time a frequent guest at Belvoir with his 
cousins, and now and then at Mount Vernon. 

The company of these gentlemen was 
of much value to me, and in all ways use- 
ful. William Fairfax was a man of honour 
and great probity; also very courteous. 
He had seen service in both Indies, and 
had divers adventures in clearing the pi- 
rates out of New Providence, all of which 
I was delighted to hear of, and he to relate. 
He had lived as a collector of customs in 
the New England colonies, having taken 
a wife at Salem, and had a greater respect 



70 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

for them than was common in Virginia. In- 
deed, in those days our planters despised 
the men of the North as mere traders and 
Puritans, while they, in their turn, con- 
sidered us godless, drunken, fox-hunting 
squires, out of which prejudices arose, dur- 
ing the great war, many jealousies and 
troubles, of which, God knows, there were 
enough without these. 

At this time I was old enough to take 
an interest in what my elders said of the 
politics of the colonies. I was more and 
more surprised to hear how lightly they 
regarded the governor. I listened also to 
their complaints of the too frequent inter- 
ference in affairs of which we knew much, 
and the advisers of the crown in England 
very little. They complained that enter- 
prise was crippled on sea and land, and 
considered smuggling a just way to escape 
some of the grievous duties laid between 
the colonies. They felt it unjust that we 
must use none but British ships on the 
ocean, and be cut off from the natural chan- 
nels of commerce, etc. I listened eagerly 
and wondered, as a boy would, why these 
great gentlemen, who seemed to me so pow- 
erful, should submit to such wrongs. They 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 71 

spoke also with anger of the way in which 
the colonies were being loaded with thieves 
and women of the worst class, sent out as 
convicts. Of the political convicts they 
spoke with pity, as indeed they might, for 
some of these were gentlemen of good 
families, and in later times, being freed, 
prospered in honourable conditions of life. 

There were some singular matters com- 
bined with the condition of indentured ser- 
vitude. Especially was I one day aston- 
ished to learn that at one time, but earlier 
than this, if the white master of an inden- 
tured man was fined and could not pay, 
the debt might be satisfied by the whipping 
of one of these bad or unfortunate servants. 

Both Fairfaxes spoke with more freedom 
of the king than did my brothers. Per- 
haps they inherited some of the liberty of 
thought which made the famous earl of 
their name a rebel to the crown in the time 
of the Commonwealth; and yet, when, at 
a later day, we had even greater cause to 
rebel, they were, to my sorrow, loyal Tories. 

I was not without younger friends, for to 
Belvoir came the Carlyles, cousins of the 
Fairfaxes from Alexandria, my own cousin 
Lawrence, with my dear cousin Robin 



72 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

Washington of Choptank, and many more, 
such as the Carys, Mrs. Fairfax's kindred, 
the Masons, and my sister Betty, a great 
favourite. But of all these people, the Lord 
Fairfax most affected my life, and indirectly 
prepared me for the career of a frontier 
officer. At this time he was fifty-nine years 
old. Although a heavy man, he was a fine 
horseman; and as I never was tired of the 
saddle, we were much engaged in the hunt- 
ing of wild foxes, or, lacking these, of foxes 
bagged by the negroes and let loose for the 
sport. He was a man who disliked women, 
and avoided society, or was inclined to be 
silent in company; but with me he was a 
most lively companion, and would tell me of 
Oxford, and of having written papers in 
the "Spectator," which I had then begun 
to read. My sister Betty was inclined to 
be merry over his lordship's fancy to have 
me ride and hunt with him, saying that as 
I never talked except to answer questions, 
and his lordship talked only once a week, 
we were well matched. My brother Law- 
rence considered her wanting in respect, 
and that his lordship might be of much 
service to me. I could talk when occasion 
served, but I had been taught that it was 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 73 

for my elders to choose whether I should 
talk or not. There were times when his 
lordship was pleased to encourage me in 
the asking of questions, and at other times 
liked to puzzle me with matters beyond 
my years. 



XI 



IN this pleasant company of William 
Fairfax and his wife, and my friend 
George William, his son, I saw with profit 
something of the ways and manners of per- 
sons of consideration, and, being by nature 
observant, profited accordingly. Indeed, the 
Lord Fairfax more than once commended 
the matter to my attention, saying that 
good and fitting manners to men of all 
classes would often obtain what could not 
be otherwise as easily had. I do not now 
recall the phrase he used, but, if I recol- 
lect, it was out of a letter written to Sir 
Philip Sidney by his father. 

I find it curious to recall how at this 
time I appeared to others, and, concerning 
this, I have found a letter addressed by 
Lord Fairfax to my mother. In one of 
her sudden and often brief ambitions for 
me, she desired to know of his lordship 

74 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 75 

whether it would not be well for me, like 

Mr. C and Colonel H , to go to 

Oxford. When riding with the old gentle- 
man the next day, he told me of her wish. 
I was surprised, but even then I knew she 
would, at the last minute, change her mind, 
and I said as much, with due respect. For 
a time he rode on in silence, and at last 
said: "Young man, this is your country; 
stay here. What do you want to do I" I 
said boldly I should like to be a surveyor 
and help in the settling and surveying of 
his lordship's lands in the valley. He said 
I was young to contend among hostile squat- 
ters, but he would talk with Lawrence of 
it. I heard no more of Oxford, and this 
is the answer he made my mother. It seems 
to me as I read this letter, after the lapse 
of forty-nine years, that what his lord- 
ship wrote was very near to the truth; 
nevertheless, it greatly displeased my 
mother. But she was always displeased 
with any one who did not agree with her, 
which, indeed, was hard to do, as sister 
Betty Lewis once said, because, when- 
ever for peace you were on her side, you 
found that she had changed to the opposite 
opinion. 



76 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

He wrote : 

Belvoir. 

Honoured Madam : You are so good as to ask 
wiiat I think of a temporary residence for your 
son George in England. It is a country for whicli 
I myself have no inclination, and the gentlemen 
you mention are certainly renowned gamblers and 
rakes, which I should be sorry your son were ex- 
posed to, even if his means easily admitted of a 
residence in England. He is strong and hard}^, 
and as good a master of a horse as any could de- 
sire. His education might have been bettered, 
but what he has is accurate and inclines him to 
much life out of doors. He is very grave for 
one of his age, and reserved in his intercourse ; 
not a great talker at any time. His mind appears 
to me to act slowly, but, on the whole, to reach 
just conclusions, and he has an ardent wish to 
see the right of questions— what my friend Mr. 
Addison was pleased to call ''the intellectual con- 
science." Method and exactness seem to be natu- 
ral to George. He is, I suspect, beginning to feel 
the sap rising, being in the spring of life, and is 
getting ready to be the prey of your sex, where- 
fore may the Lord help him, and deliver him from 
the nets those spiders, called women, will cast for 
his ruin. I presume him to be truthful because 
he is exact. I wish I could say that he governs 
his temper. He is subject to attacks of anger on 
provocation, and sometimes without just cause ; 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 77 

but as he is a reasonable person, time will cure 
bim of this vice of nature, and in fact he is, in my 
judgment, a man who will go to school all his 
life and profit thereby. 

I hope, madam, that you will find pleasure in 
what I have written, and will rest assured that 
I shall continue to interest myself in his for- 
tunes. 

Much honoured by your appeal to my judg- 
ment, I am, my dear madam, your obedient hum- 
ble servant, 

Fairfax. 

To Mrs. Mary Washington 

My nephew Bushrod Washington, in ar- 
ranging my papers, placed all my Fairfax 
letters in one packet, and thus it chances 
that lying next to this one is a letter from 
Bryan Fairfax, the brother of my older 
friend, written in 1778 from New York. I 
am pleased to find it here, and thus to be 
reminded of the vast changes through which 
time gives us opportunities. I had been 
able to stop the Whigs in New York from 
offensive attacks upon this gentleman, and 
on this he wrote : 

There are times when favours conferred make 
a greater impression than at others ; for, though 



78 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

I have received many, I hope I have not been un- 
mindful of them ; yet that, at a time j^our popu- 
larity was at the highest and mine at the lowest, 
and when it is so common for men's political re- 
sentments to run up so high against those who 
differ from them in opinion, you should act with 
your wonted kindness toward me, has affected me 
more than any favour I have received ; and such 
conduct could not be believed by some in New 
York, it being above the run of common minds. 

When Lord Fairfax died in liis ninety- 
second year, my old comrade, this Bryan 
Fairfax, became the heir to his title, but I 
believe never allowed himself the use of it, 
and, becoming a clergyman of our church, 
is still thus engaged. 

The finding of these two letters moved 
me more than common. Two matters are 
alluded to in his lordship's letter to my 
mother which, otherwise, I might not have 
reminded myself of, and yet one of them 
had an important influence on my life. 

I had been told, of a Sunday morning, 
of a great flock of ducks, of the kind called 
canvasback, and much esteemed. It was 
against our habits to shoot on this day, 
but towards evening, the temptation being- 
great, I went to the shore and was about to 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 79 

push off, when Peter, using the liberty of 
an old family servant, said I would make 
Mr. Fairfax and my brother, then like my- 
self at Belvoir, angry if I went. When he 
held on to the prow to stay me, I suddenly 
lost my temper and struck him with an oar 
on the head. He fell down and lay in a sort 
of a shake. I thought he was killed, and 
had he been white I must surely have put an 
end to him ; but the blacks have thick skulls, 
and presently he got up and staggered away, 
his head bleeding. I was both sorry and 
scared, for he would not wait when I called, 
but walked off to the quarters of the slaves. 
I stood still a minute, and then went to 
the house and told Lawrence, and asked 
him to have the man looked after. Law- 
rence, being very angry, said : ' ' This comes 
of your hot temper. Once our father nearly 
killed a man for a small matter, and that 
cured him; I hope this may cure you." I 
said nothing, and went to see if the man 
was badly hurt. Peter only laughed and 
said: "Master George, you hit mighty 
hard." I liked the man, and, although no 
one else spoke of the matter again, it had 
more effect on me than the many good reso- 
lutions I had written or made as to keeping 



80 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

my temper. I have rarely lost it completely 
since that time: once at Monmouth, once 
after Edmund Randolph's treachery, and 
once when General Knox, then of my cabi- 
net, showed me a vile caricature of myself 
being guillotined. 



XII 

I IKE other men, I have had my times of 
J being irritable, but open anger is with 
me like to a tornado, and if I give way I 
am as is a ship in a storm when no anchors 
hold. General Hamilton, on one occasion, 
observed to me that there were some tal- 
ents which it was good that men should 
know you to be possessed of, because once 
they were aware of this, you were not so 
apt to be called upon to use them, and this 
may be true of that rage of anger I now 
speak of. But I cannot think it a thing of 
value, nor of any real use; for if it follow 
another's actions, it can do no good, and 
there are better ways of showing disappro- 
bation. 

The other matter to which his lordship 
alludes is that I was, at this time, the vic- 
tim of one of those attachments to a lady 
older than myself from which lads are apt 
to suffer. It was not the last, for in the 

SI 



82 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

composition of the human frame there is 
a good deal of inflammable matter. My 
fancy lasted for some months, but was 
cured at last by hard work and life in the 
saddle. It was full time that I got away 
from the easy hospitality of Belvoir and 
Mount Vernon. A masterful nature amid 
slaves is not so well situated as among 
scenes where he has to contend with those 
who can resist. Since I became a man I 
never approved of human slavery, and 
surely the worst thing ever done to the colo- 
nies was the act of England in forcing upon 
us an endurance of the trade in slaves. The 
evil results of this tyranny I do not propose 
to discuss fully, but sure I am that the con- 
tinuance of this form of servitude will some 
day give rise to troubles. I find myself, 
however, inclined to believe that the habit 
of mastery, also the aristocratic turn which 
society acquired in Virginia, had a certain 
value in our war with the mother country. 
In Virginia the minor officers, such as cap- 
tains, were of a higher class than their pri- 
vates, and for this reason, and on account 
of being from youth upward accustomed to 
command obedience and exact discipline, 
were in this respect well fitted for warfare. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 83 

In New England, especially, under more 
democratic circumstances, and also because 
tliere were few slaves, the officers, such 
as captains and lieutenants, were unused to 
control men who, being of their own class, 
acknowledged of late years no such differ- 
ences of position as in Virginia, and were 
very insubordinate. I found in this state of 
things a serious obstacle to discipline when 
I first took command at Cambridge. 

On the other hand, it is worthy of remark 
that no general officers of great distinction 
were of Southern birth. All of those on 
whom I learned to depend most largely were 
born in the North, or had lived long in the 
colonies north of Maryland. Of these were 
the generals Knox, Morgan, Wayne, Ham- 
ilton, Montgomery, Schuyler, Greene, and, 
alas ! Arnold ; and generally these were men 
who were not of the upper classes. This is 
a matter which I once had occasion to men- 
tion to Mr. Edmund Pendleton, who was of 
opinion that, as the first open warfare was 
at the North, and the first army there col- 
lected, it was natural that the early oppor- 
tunities and high commissions should have 
fallen to men of the North. I was unable to 
deny this, but upon reflection it does not 



A 



84 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

present to me a satisfactory explanation, 
since the actual war lasted seven years and 
afforded many chances to men of all sec- 
tions. I find myself naturally drawn into 
these reflections by the events of my early 
life, but such interruptions are of no mo- 
ment, because I am endeavouring, for my 
own satisfaction and with no thought of 
others, to consider rather how certain steps 
in life prepared me for larger tasks, than 
with a view to any connected narration. 

There lived near Mount Vernon at this 
time a man named Van Braam, a Dutch- 
man, who, having served under my brother 
Lawrence at Cartagena, was used at times 
as a clerk. He was a slight, wiry little man, 
and dependent in those days on my bro- 
ther's aid. He spoke French, but whether 
well or ill I was too ignorant to know; yet, 
because of his supposed knowledge, he came 
later to be the innocent means of getting 
himself and me into unpleasant difficulties. 
Like Lawrence, he was an accomplished 
swordsman; and I received from him les- 
sons in the small sword, and became myself 
expert in this, as I have usually been in all 
exercise involving strength and accuracy, 
being more quick of body than of mind. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 85 

This talent of the sword was an accom- 
plishment which I never had to use per- 
sonally, nor have I ever been so unfortunate 
as to have needed it in the duel. Experi- 
ence has proved that chance is often as 
much concerned in these encounters as 
bravery, and always more than the justice 
of the cause. I felt regret that my friend, 
General Cadwalader, should have exposed 
a valuable life to the pistol of a man like 
General Conway, especially since the real 
cause of the quarrel was, I am assured, lan- 
guage used by the latter which my friend 
knew I could not resent. 

Indeed, in an affair like that of these two 
generals, it would have been reasonable to 
have decided by lot which was wrong ; for a 
farthing was tossed as to who should be 
first to fire, and both were good shots. 
Happily, my friend was fortunate, and the 
other, who had considered his honour 
wounded, was now in addition wounded in 
his tongue— the organ which made all the 
mischief. 

This lamentable manner of settling dis- 
putes was the occasion, while we lay at the 
Valley Forge, of our losing valuable offi- 
cers. I have always discouraged it. Many 



86 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

of the duels in the war might have been 
avoided by the help of judicious friends. 
Wlien Captain Paul Jones desired to call 
out Mr, Arthur Lee, I dissuaded him from 

asking my friends, the two C s, to be 

his advisers, on account of the too pug- 
nacious tendencies of these gentlemen of 
Welsh blood. 



XIII 

THE question of whether I should be- 
come a surveyor by profession was 
much debated among us. My youth was 
against it, but I was in strength and serious- 
ness older than my years. My mother op- 
posed it, as she did every change, being of 
those who are defeated beforehand by ob- 
stacles. Without any better plan of life to 
offer, she insisted that it was not an occu- 
pation for a gentleman. This was, in a 
measure, true in Virginia. The bounds of 
estates were often vague or contested, and 
there was a strong prejudice against the 
persons employed to settle these disputes, 
or who were engaged in laying out new 
plantations beyond the Alleghanies, and 
who took daily wages, like mechanics. 

The planters settled on the tide-water 
coast or on the rich river lands were long 
since uneasy because they feared the set- 
tlements made inland might interfere with 

87 



88 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

their control of the trade in tobacco, in the 
culture of which they were exhausting the 
soil. At one time the king endeavoured to 
prevent settlements beyond the mountains, 
under the pretence that they would be too 
little under government. It was believed, 
however, that the jealousy of the long-set- 
tled planters was the real means of bringing 
about this decree, which no one obeyed. 
The more enterprising families, who were 
disposed to engage in the acquisition of 
such lands, were looked upon with suspi- 
cion. Nor were their active agents re- 
garded with favour. Indeed, long after- 
wards I was subject to reproach because 
of having been engaged in the occupation 
of a surveyor of lands. The prejudice en- 
tertained by the gentry of Virginia was not 
without foundation in the character of 
many of those who were thus employed, for 
they were not all of a decent class, arid were 
subject to be influenced by bribes, so that 
out of their misconduct arose many tedious 
disputes as to boundaries. 

Although among my elders there was 
much discussion as to my choice of a means 
of livelihood, I cannot remember that it in 
any way affected my own resolutions or, 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 89 

in the end, those of my brothers. It was 
finally concluded that I was to serve under 
Mr. Genu, my former instructor in surve}^- 
ing, and was to be accompanied by Mr. 
George William Fairfax on a visit to the 
estate of Lord Fairfax, 

The prospect of being able to earn my 
own living, and of a life in the wilderness, 
filled me with pleasure, and I set about pre- 
paring flints, powder, and shot for the new 
fowling-piece his lordship was so kind as to 
give me. I had the foresight, also, to take 
some lessons in the shoeing of horses, and, 
after a visit to my mother, was fully pre- 
pared for my journey. 

I hold it most fortunate that my own 
inclinations and the good sense of my bro- 
thers set me to work at a time of life when 
temptations are most dangerous because of 
their novelty. Many of the young men I 
knew became brutal from contact with 
slaves, and spent their lives, like some of 
their elders, in fighting cocks and dogs and 
in running quarter-races. A few men were 
brought up to professions; but as estates 
were entailed on elder sons, or they, at least, 
received the larger portions, and there was 
no army or navy, the younger sons were 



90 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

generally without occupation and apt to 
fall into evil ways. I little knew, when I 
rode away, how fortunate was my choice. 

We set out on March 11, 1747, George 
William Fairfax and I, with two servants 
and a led horse, loaded with a pack and 
such baggage as could not be carried in 
saddle-bags. I was at this time ill, not hav- 
ing recovered from an attack of the ague; 
but the action of the horse and the feeling 
of adventure helped me, so that in a day 
or two I left off taking of Jesuits' bark, and 
was none the worse. 

I have now before me the diary I kept 
as a lad of near sixteen years. It was not 
so well kept as it was later, but already in 
it I discover with interest that it turns to 
practical matters, like the value of the land 
and what could be produced on it. 

As we were soon joined by my old mas- 
ter in surveying, James Genu, I learned a 
great deal more of his useful art, and usu- 
ally earned a doubloon a day, but some- 
times six pistoles. Although the idea of 
daily wages was unpleasant to Virginians 
of my class, I remember that it made me 
feel independent, and set a sort of value 
upon me which reasonably fed my esteem 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 91 

of myself, which was, I do believe, never 
too great. 

Our journey was without risks, except 
the rattlesnakes, and the many smaller ver- 
min which inhabited the blankets in the 
cabins of the squatters, 

I remember with pleasure the evening 
when I first saw the great fertile valley 
after we came through Ashby 's Gap in the 
Blue Ridge. The snows were still melting, 
and on this account the streams were high 
and the roads the worst that could ever be 
seen, even in Virginia. The greatness of 
the trees I remember, and my surprise that 
the Indians should have so much good in- 
vention in their names, as when they called 
the river of the valley the Shen-an-do-ali— 
that is, the Daughter of the Stars ; but why 
so named I never knew. 

In this great vale were the best of Lord 
Fairfax 's lands. Near to where this stream 
joins the Potomac were many clearings, of 
which we had to make surveys and insist on 
his lordship's ownership. Here were no 
hardships, and much pleasure in the pursuit 
of game, especially wild turkeys. I learned 
to cook, and how to make a bivouac com- 
fortable, and many things which are part 



92 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

of the education of the woods. Only four 
nights did I sleep in a bed, and then had 
more small company than I liked to enter- 
tain. 

I copy here as it was wrote by me, a 
lad of sixteen, what we saw on a Wednes- 
day, It might have been better spelled. 

At evening we were agreeably surprised by 
ye sight of thirty odd Indians coming from war 
with only one scalp. We gave them some liquor, 
which, elevating tlieir spirits, put them in ye hu- 
mour of dancing. The}' seat themselves around 
a great fire, and one leaps up as if out of a sleep, 
and runs and jumps about ye ring in a most 
cornicle manner; afterward others. Then begins 
there musicians to •p]ay and to beat a pot half 
full of water, with a deer-skin tied tight over it, 
and a gourd with some shott in it to rattle, and 
piece of a horse tail tied to it to make it look fine. 

The Dutch, then of late come in from 
Pennsylvania, I found an uncouth people, 
who, having squatted, as we say, on lands 
not their own, hoped to acquire cheap titles. 
They were merry and full of antic tricks. 
I talked with some by an interpreter and 
heard them say they cared not who were the 
masters, French or English, if only they 



THE YOUTH OP WASHINGTON 93 

were let to farm their lands. This amazed 
me, who was brought up to despise the 
French as frog-eating folk, and, indeed, this 
indifference of the Dutch became a matter 
of concern when we had a war with the 
French. 

After one night in a Dutch cabin I liked 
better a bearskin and the open air, for it 
was not to my taste to lie down on straw- 
very populous— or on a skin with a man, 
wife, and squalling babies, like dogs and 
cats, and to cast lots who should be nearest 
the fire. 

I did not like these people, and the In- 
dians interested me more. Genn under- 
stood their tongue well enough to talk with 
them, and the way they had of sign-lan- 
guage pleased Lord Fairfax, because, he 
said, you could not talk too much in signs 
or easily abuse your neighbour ; but I found 
they had a sign for cutting a man's throat, 
and it seemed to me that was quite enough, 
and worse than abuse. Mr. Genn warned 
me that one of their great jokes was, when 
shaking hands with white men, to squeeze 
so as to give pain. Being warned, I gave 
the chief who was called Big Bear such 
a grip that, in his surprise, he cried out, and 



94 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

thus much amused the other warriors. This 
incident is not in my diary, and I find it 
remarkable that now, after so many years, 
it should come to mind, when even some 
more serious affairs are quite forgot. 



XIV 

EARLY in April, having completed our 
work, I crossed the mountains afoot to 
the Great Cacapehon, and, passing over the 
Blue Ridge, on April 12 found myself again 
at Mount Vernon. But before that I first 
rode on to Belvoir, that I might be prompt 
to answer his lordship's questions. All he 
would talk about was how to get horse and 
man over rivers, and of a way I learned of 
an Indian to wade across a strong swift 
stream safely, even breast-high, by carry- 
ing a heavy stone to keep me on my feet. 
He advised me to learn the sign-language 
of the savages. 

He was soon to set out for the valley, 
where he meant to lay out the manor of 
Greenway Court and there reside. He de- 
sired me to come and help to survey his 
great domain. 

There must be some natural taste in 
man for the life in the woods, and, for my 

95 



96 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

part, I longed ever to return to them, of 
which, sooner or later, I had many oppor- 
tunities. Nor did the free life make me 
less, but rather more, practical, and I 
learned to observe the trees, and how the 
land lay, and the meadows, whether liable 
to flood or not, all of which enabled me 
not only to serve my employers well, but 
was of use to me when I became able to 
purchase land myself. 

About this time the influence of Lord 
Fairfax and my brothers obtained for me 
the place of surveyor of the county of Cul- 
peper, I saw, a few years ago, in the rec- 
ords of Culpeper Court House, under date 
of July 20, 1749, that George Washington, 
gentleman, produced a commission from 
the president and masters of William and 
Mary College appointing him to be a sur- 
veyor of the county, whereupon he took the 
oath to his Majesty's person and govern- 
ment, and subscribed the abjuration oath, 
the test, etc. 

I recall now the pleasure this formal ap- 
pointment gave me. Although I was then 
but seventeen years old, I was much trusted 
and was soon busily employed, because of 
my exactness, and because it was known 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 97 

that I could not be bribed; and thus for 
over two years I pursued this occupation. 
His lordship had long since this time left 
his cousin's house of Belvoir and gone to 
live in the valley, in his steward's house, 
which now he bettered and enlarged for his 
own use, meaning soon to build a great 
mansion-house, which he never did. 

His home was a long, low stone dwelling, 
with a sloped roof, and many coops where 
swallows came, and bird-cotes under the 
eaves, and around it on all sides a wide 
porch, with, in every direction, the great 
forest of gum and hickory and oaks, and 
the tulip-trees. 1 found the roads much im- 
proved on my first visit, and many out- 
buildings for slaves and others, with ken- 
nels for the hounds his lordship loved to 
follow. My own room was ever after kept 
for me. It had a wide dormer-window, and 
next to it a room with more books than I 
had ever seen before, except at Westover, 
Colonel Byrd's great mansion. 

I never passed the time more agreeably. 
When not absent laying out land, we 
hunted and shot game, especially wild tur- 
keys, which abounded ; and when the wea- 
ther served us ill I read the history of 



98 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

England, and tried to please his lordship 
by reading Shakspere and other books of 
verse. But although I had by hard labor 
managed to lay out and plot verses to cer- 
tain young women, I never found much 
pleasure in the use of the imagination, nor 
in what others made of it. It seemed to 
me tedious and without practical value, nor 
did it amuse me except when it was in a 
play. 

For days at a time I sometimes saw 
nothing of this kind but eccentric noble- 
man. A woman in England was said to 
have wounded his life, and it was rare that 
we had any female guests at Greenway 
Court, except Anne Gary, the sister of 
George William Fairfax's wife. I found 
it not good for me to be in her company, 
for in some way she brought to my mind 
a boy love, which I had resolved no more to 
entertain, but which I found it difficult to 
master. 

Miss Gary stayed no long time, and others 
came and went, but for the most part 1 
had his lordship to myself. There were 
days when he was absent in the woods with 
a servant, or alone. At others he would 
remain all day shut up in a small log house, 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 99 

not over fifteen feet square, where he slept, 
and, as he said, very ill. It was his cus- 
tom, however, to join me at supper, and 
then to remain smoking, which I never 
learned, and taking his punch. He was 
either full of talk or so silent that we would 
not exchange a word while he sat staring 
into the fire. Sometimes, when tired, I fell 
asleep, and, on waking, found him gone to 
hed. When disposed for conversation, he 
was apt to he bitter about his native land, 
and once said that the best part of it had 
come away. 

My brother Lawrence and he were the 
only persons of our own class I ever knew 
in those days who, to my surprise, foresaw 
serious trouble from the selfish policy of 
the crown and the greed of English mer- 
chants, who desired to keep us shut out of 
the natural way of sea trade. I should 
have been most ungrateful, which I never 
was, had I not felt my obligations to Lord 
Fairfax. His great wealth and high posi- 
tion kept even my mother satisfied that 
what pleased my patron could never be 
complained of, and so, for a season, I was 
let to go my own way. 

He led me to feel sure that, soon or late, 



^•ofC. 



100 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

we must be at war with both France and 
the Indians, or else submit to be shut out 
of the fertile lands to the westward. He 
was almost the only Englishman of high 
rank whom we saw in Virginia. There were 
governors with their secretaries, and offi- 
cers of the army, but, except my lord, all of 
them regarded the gentlemen of the colo- 
nies as inferior persons. This feeling was, 
I apprehend, due to the fact that we looked 
to England for everything, and were in 
many ways kept as dependent as children. 
He once said to me that we were like slow 
bullocks that did not know their power to 
resist. This was all strange to a young 
Virginian in those days. I have lived to 
see its wisdom, and now, as I think of it, 
am reminded that Mr. Hamilton once wrote 
to me, ''a colony was always a colony, and 
never could be a country until it had al- 
together to stand on its own legs. ' ' 

This was spoken of Canada, which un- 
wisely refused to make common cause with 
us, and will now be for us at least a trou- 
blesome, if not a dangerous neighbour. 

But to see her in the hands of France 
was not, as the matter presented itself, to 
be desired, for which reason I did not at 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 101 

a later time encourage Marquis Lafayette 
in his design upon Canada, knowing that 
if we succeeded in the war, and with French 
troops were able to take Canada, France 
would claim it as her share of the spoils, 
and thus hem us in from Louisiana to the 
Great Lakes. Indeed, this was very early 
a constant fear throughout all the colonies, 
and especially in New England, where the 
notion of being shut in by a popish nation 
added to their uneasiness. 

When considering this matter, I recall 
the effect of the capitulations of 1759, for 
at that time, in order to quiet the French 
after England had taken Canada, and to 
get the Canadians to accept willingly Eng- 
lish rule, vast and unwise privileges were 
granted to the Church of Rome. Still later 
the Quebec Act of 1774 decreed that Quebec 
should be held to extend over all the coun- 
try west of the Ohio and up to the lakes, 
and thus that the privileges enjoyed by the 
Romish Church should prevail over all this 
great dominion. 

While the Stamp Act and the laws re- 
strictive of trade did variously annoy the 
separate colonies, the Quebec Act produced 
a still more general dissatisfaction. 



XV 

WHILE at Greenway Court I had 
other teachers besides his lordship, 
for many Indians, frontier traders, and 
trappers came to claim food and shelter, 
which were never denied them. Often the 
woods were lighted up by their fires, and I 
found it of use, and interesting, to hear 
what was said and to learn something of the 
uncertain ways of the savages. 

I heard how the Del a wares, Shawnees, 
and Iroquois had wandered from the north 
and taken to the lands about the Ohio, and 
how the French protected them and claimed 
all the country up to the Alleghanies. 

To these camps came the rude, lawless 
traders from Pennsylvania, who had stories 
to tell of the Indians and of the French 
beyond the Ohio. These men foresaw a 
war on the frontier when scarce any others 
did, and, by their accounts of the fertility 
of the wide savannas beyond the Ohio, filled 

102 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 103 

me with desire to explore tliis rich wilder- 
ness. I learned that already the French 
had warned the fur-traders to leave and 
had driven away their hunters, and when 
I mentioned this to Lawrence he said we 
were not easy folk to drive, and, least of 
all, Pennsylvania Quakers, and that there 
would be trouble, which there was soon 
enough. We were on the edge of a strug- 
gle in which all the world was to share. 
Meanwhile, time went on, and what Lord 
Fairfax called the " frontier pot " was 
boiling. 

I was often back at home, sometimes 
with my mother, or at Belvoir, or at Mount 
Vernon, riding to hounds, surveying, and 
making more than I needed in the way of 
money, and enough to keep me in horse- 
flesh and to give me better clothes, for 
which I have alwaj^s had a fancy. Only in 
the woods I liked best such dress as our 
rangers wear, and good moccasins are the 
best of foot-gear. But as to clothing, when 
not in the woods, I found in myself a liking 
for a plain genteel dress of the best, with- 
out lace or embroidery.' Fine clothes do 
not make fine men, and the man must be 
foolish who has a better opinion of himself 



104 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

because his clothes are such as the truly 
judicious and sensible do not advise. 

Until I had money of my own I did not 
venture much at cards ; but now I played a 
little, although I was never fond of it, and 
lost more than I made. I was more inclined 
to the game of billiards. 

If at times I was in danger of leaning 
towards the rough ways of the wilderness, 
I had the advantage of seeing at Mount 
Vernon, or at the homes of the Carters and 
Lees, or among the Lewises of Warner 
Hall, and elsewhere, the older gentry, who 
were orderly and ceremonious, and who re- 
minded me anew of his lordship 's lesson as 
to the value of good manners. 

Sometimes on these great plantations I 
was employed in surveys, but at others, as 
at Shirley and the Corbins', I was only a 
guest. I was, I conceive, unlike the idle 
young men of some of these houses, for I 
was over-grave and cared less for card- 
playing and hard drinking than suited 
them. 

I found myself at this time preferring 
the society of women, who are always ami- 
ably disposed to overlook the shyness of 
men like myself, and with whom it is pos- 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 105 

sible to be agreeable without either punch 
or tobacco; but racing of horses I always 
liked, and dancing. 

In those days cock-fighting was also to 
my liking. I remember well, because it 
was at Yorktown, a great main of cocks in 
1752 between Gloucester and York for five 
pistoles each battle, and one hundred the 
odd. I was disappointed to leave before 
it was decided. I saw there a greater cock- 
fight in after days, 

I recall now that my brother Lawrence 
once wrote home from Appleby School that 
each boy must pay to the master on Easter 
Tuesday a penny to provide the school with 
a cock-fight. 

As to the hard drinking of rum and 
bumbo, Madeira and sangaree, I never had 
a head for it, or any liking, nor for the 
English way of locking doors until the half 
were under the table. These things were 
not encouraged in the better houses, but 
sometimes they were not to be avoided with- 
out giving offence. The great war helped 
to better these foolish customs, and now 
they are more rare. 

I remember, about this time, to have seen 
such an occasion on a hot day in July at 



106 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

L Hall, where I was come to survey 



a jDlot of meadow-land. I arrived about 
7 P.M., and I must needs go at once to sup 
with a gay comjDany of men, very fine in 
London clothes. I would have excused my- 
self to be of the party, but no one would 
listen to me, and, although dusty and tired, 
I was pulled in whether I would or not. We 
had a great supper, and Madeira wine, and 
much rum punch, with wine-glasses which 
had no stands or bottoms and must, there- 
fore, be kept m the hand until emptied. 
When it became very warm, negroes were 
sent for to fan us and to keep off the flies. 
At last there was a dispute as to game- 
cocks, and two were fetched in, very sleepy, 
and set on the table to fight, which they 
were little of a mind to, but were urged 
until feathers and blood were all over the 
table. When songs were sung, and most 
very drunk, and the King toasted, I slipped 
away, and would have got out the door, but 
found it locked. Being unable to escape, 
I was forced to return to the table. At last 
a lighted candle having been set before each 
guest, our host called on us to rise, and 
when he cried out his toast, ''The Ladies, 
God bless them!" each gentleman, having 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 107 

drained his glass, used it to extinguish the 
candle-light set before him. It seemed to 
me a strange custom. I took advantage of 
the darkness to get out of an open window, 
and was pursued by two or three, who fell 
on the way, so that I got back to the house 
and to bed, liking none of it. But now all 
this is much amended, and there is more 
moderation in drinking, but still too much 
of this evil custom. 

I am led here to remark that in the 
War of Independency many officers who 
were otherwise competent failed because of 
drunkenness, and, indeed, at Germantown 
this was one cause of our losing the battle. 
When it became needful after St. Clair's 
defeat in 1791 to appoint general officers, I 
furnished my cabinet with a statement of 
the names and characters of such officers as, 
having served under me, I knew should be 
considered. As concerned most of them, I 
found it well to state whether or not they 
were addicted to spirits, so common was 
this practice. 

It seems very remarkable that so few 
gentlemen should have foreseen what was 
plain to the trappers and dealers in furs. 
All of the Ohio country was claimed by both 



108 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

French and English. The Indians, although 
cheated and made drunk, were still in pos- 
session of the woods they considered to be 
their own. Virginia claimed what Penn- 
sylvania, and even Connecticut, said was 
theirs; Pennsylvania was reaping the only 
harvest of the wilderness, of the value of 
some fifty thousand pounds a year, the 
trade in furs ; last of all, in 1749, some en- 
terprising gentlemen in England and Vir- 
ginia planned the Ohio Company, meaning 
to colonize even north of the Ohio. 

AVhen Mr. Thomas Lee, president of the 
council, died, my brother Lawrence became 
the head of the Ohio Company, and all of 
this, as I now see, had much to do with the 
next change in my life. I find it pleasant 
again to dwell here on the good sense and 
liberal spirit of my brother, who, had his 
life been spared, would surely have been 
chosen to do that which has fallen to me. 
His character is well seen in his desire that 
the Dutch from Pennsylvania, whom he in- 
vited as settlers, being dissenters and hav- 
ing come into the jurisdiction of Virginia, 
should not be forced to pay parish rates 
and support clergymen of the Church of 
England, as all dissenters were obliged to 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 109 

do. He urged that restraints of conscience 
were cruel, and injurious to the country im- 
posing them, and he wrote : 

I may quote as example England, Holland, 
and Prussia, and, much more, Pennsylvania, which 
has flourished under that delightful liberty, so as 
to become the admiration of every man who con- 
siders the short time it has been settled, whereas 
Virginia has increased by slow degrees, although 
much older. 

There, on our borders, as Lord Fairfax 
said, was much powder, and only one spark 
needed to set it off. Meanwhile Mr. Gist 
set out to survey the grant of the Ohio 
Company, on the south side of the Ohio 
River, all of which was greatly to concern 
my life. 

Virginia and Pennsylvania were, at that 
time, much stirred up by the hostile threats 
of France, and efforts began to be made 
to prepare for hostilities on the frontier. 
About this time, but the exact date I fail 
to recall, my brother Lawrence abandoned 
all concern in the military line of life, and 
arranged that his place of major in the 
militia should be given up to me, and that 
I should also take his position as district 
adjutant. 



XVI 

DURING the summer of 1751 1 saw with 
affectionate anxiety a great change in 
the health of my brother Lawrence. I re- 
member no event of my life which caused 
me more concern. Since our father's death 
he had been both father and friend. Had it 
not been for him, I should not have known 
Mr. Fairfax and his cousin, Lord Fairfax, 
nor without their help could I have be- 
come employed in a way which brought 
about my service on the frontier and all 
that came after. Thus, in the providence 
of the Ruler of the events of this world, 
one step leads on to another, and we are 
always being educated for that which is to 
come. 

At last, in September, Lawrence, who 
had been long ill of a phthisical complaint, 
asked me to go with him to the Barbados. 
Therefore, while Mr. Gist's surveys on the 
Ohio went on, and both English and French 

110 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 111 

were making bids to secure the Indians, we 
were on the sea. It is far from my purpose 
to recall what, after a constant habit, is set 
down in my diary. I lost in the Barbados 
what good looks a clear skin gave me, be- 
cause of a mild attack of smallpox, such as 
a third of the human race must expect, and 
I remain slightly pitted to this day. 

What most struck me in the islands was 
the richness of the soil, and yet that nearly 
all the planters were in debt, and estates 
over-billed and alienated. They were all 
spendthrifts, and I remind myself that I 
resolved at that time never to be in the 
grasp of the enemy called Debt. How per- 
sons coming to estates of three hundred or 
four hundred acres could want was to me 
most wonderful. 

Lawrence now declared for Bermuda, and 
as he seemed better, I felt able to leave him 
and return. To be torn by the demands 
of public duty on the one hand and by the 
call of affection on the other, I have many 
times been subjected to. Lawrence insisted 
that matters at home made urgent my re- 
turn, and, indeed, through life I have al- 
ways held that the public service comes 
first. 



112 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

I reached home in the ship Industry^ 
in February, 1752, having had enough of 
the sea in a five weeks' voyage, and very 
stormy. 

Lawrence was at times better and de- 
sired to remain a year in Bermuda, and for 
me to fetch his wife. But soon his mind 
changed, and he wrote that he was resolved 
to hurry home, as he said, to his grave. 

In the little time that was between his 
return and his passing away, I was much 
in his company— nor have I ever since been 
long without thought of him ; for, although 
I am not disposed to speak much of sorrow, 
nor ever was, his great patience under suf- 
fering, and how he would never complain, 
but comfort his wife and me as if we were 
those in pain, and not he, have often been 
in my mind, and particularly of late, since 
the increase of my own infirmities has re- 
minded me that the end of life cannot be 
very remote, 

I am of opinion that I must have seemed, 
when younger, to be a dull, plodding lad; 
but, as time went on, Lawrence came to 
think more of me than did any, except Lord 
Fairfax, and in this his last illness gave 
me such evidence of his esteem as greatly 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 113 

strengthened my hope that I should justify 
his belief in me. 

General Hamilton once asked me whe- 
ther I did not think that at the approach 
of death men seem sometimes to acquire 
such clearness of mind as they might be 
thought to obtain beyond the grave. I had 
to reply that such considerations were re- 
mote from my usual subjects of reflection; 
but what he then said, although I had no 
suitable reply, reminded me of certain 
things Lawrence said to me, and of his 
certainty that I should attain honourable 
distinction. I thought him then more affec- 
tionate than just, for I have never esteemed 
myself very highly ; but I know that I have 
never ceased to do what I believed to be 
my duty, and as to this my conscience is 
clear. 

My dear Lawrence died at Mount Ver- 
non, July 12, 1752, aged thirty-five years, 
and thus I lost the man who had most be- 
friended me. As his infant daughter Sarah 
inherited his estate, and I, although only 
twenty years old, was one of his executors, 
my time was fully occupied by this and by 
the increase of public duties, which were 
made heavy by the want of good officers 



114 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

and by the insubordination and drunken- 
ness of their men. Even then I saw what 
must come of it all if we had a serious 
war, for the militia could not by law be 
used more than five miles outside of the 
colony, and we should have to rely upon 
volunteers for more extended service. 

The little maid, my niece, at Mount Ver- 
non, did not live long after her father's 
death, and thus, as I have before stated, in 
1754 the estate fell to me under the will 
of my father. It was charged with a life- 
interest in favour of my brother 's wife, who 
soon married Mr. George Lee of West- 
moreland. I was obligated to pay her fif- 
teen thousand pounds of tobacco yearly; 
and as the estate, because of Lawrence's 
illness, had fallen away, I was little the 
better for the property until her death in 
1761. 



XVII 

ON my brother's return, although very 
ill, he interested himself in my future, 
and it was, no doubt, in part due to his in- 
fluence that, before his death, I was called to 
Williamsburg, the seat of government, by 
Governor Dinwiddle, who told me he was 
advised to make me one of the adjutant- 
generals. To my surprise, he seemed to 
consider me competent, and, owing to my 
brother, and jDrobably also to the advice of 
the Fairfaxes, I received this appointment 
for the Northern Division, one of the four 
now newly created, with the rank of major 
and one hundred and fifty colonial pounds 
a year. 

To this day I do not fully understand 
why I so easily secured this important ap- 
pointment. I was only nineteen and knew 
nothing of war. As I consider the matter, 
there were many more experienced men, 
who, like Lawrence, had served at sea and 

115 



116 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

on land. The other adjutants were older 
than I. One of them said I would have a 
bitter business, for the chief use of the 
militia was to search negro cabins for arms 
and to get drunk on training-days. Never- 
theless, as I knew well enough, there was 
good stuff in the men of Virginia, and no 
better could be found than the men of the 
frontier, who were expert with the rifle and 
were more than a match for the Indians. 
As I learned from Lawrence, the candi- 
dates for these places of adjutant were 
either too old or were men of drunken 
habits; and as to the wandering soldiers of 
fortune who had had experience in war, 
they were not gentlemen of our own class, 
and this, I understood, was a question 
which the governor and council considered 
important. 

Allien I went again to accept and thank 
.the governor for the appointment, he talked 
to me at some length, and I learned that 
he was more largely interested in the Ohio 
Company than I had previously known, 
and that one reason for my appointment 
was my familiarity with the frontier coun- 
try, where I might have to serve. Without 
further troubling myself as to why I, a 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 117 

young man of nineteen, was thus chosen, 
I set earnestly about my work. I found it 
no easy task. I myself had much to learn, 
and, hj Lawrence's advice, secured Mr. 
Muse, formerly adjutant of a regiment, who 
had served with my brother in the Spanish 
war and now resided near us in Westmore- 
land. This old soldier lent me books on 
tactics, and taught me the manual of the 
soldier, which was to prove of small value 
on the frontier. Van Braam was also put 
to use, as I wished now to learn the broad- 
sword. 

Meanwhile, at intervals, I rode through 
the counties of my district, and did my 
best to ascertain how many men could be 
counted on, and to stiffen the lax discipline 
of the county militia. 

I soon discovered that the governor, 
Robert Dinwiddle, was more intent on mak- 
ing money than on governing wisely. 

Appointments to office, in my youth, 
were very often obtained through family 
and other influence, and were, like mine, 
critically considered by many. Indeed, in 
this year, not long before Lawrence died, 
Mr. George Fairfax mentioned to me that, 
being at Greenway Court, and Mr. Meade 



118 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

present, that gentleman inquired of him 
how it chanced that a man so j^oung as I 
should have succeeded to obtain what older 
men had failed to get. His lordship replied 
for his cousin that he was mistaken as to 
my age, for all the Washingtons were born 
old, and he supposed that I was near about 
thirty. ]\Ir. Meade said that it was thought 
my lord Imew best who pulled the strings, 
but to this, as George Fairfax said, laugh- 
ing, his lordship only smoked a reply. 

This Mr. Meade was the father of Rich- 
ard, who served well as one of my aides in 
the great war. David Meade, the second 
son, was of those who believed that Colo- 
nel Byrd should have been made com- 
mander-in-chief by the Congress. It may 
be that he was right, or would have been so 
had Colonel Byrd been more decided in his 
opinions. He had both ability and military 
experience. 

Mr. Meade was not alone in this opinion, 
and was said to have himself entertained 
the belief that, although I was, as he said, 
a good business man and of irreproachable 
morals, Colonel Byrd of Westover was my 
superiour in some respects and in none my 
inferiour, and of even greater experience in 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 119 

war. I have had at times to contradict the 
statement that there was no opposition to 
my appointment. I may add that I made 
no effort to secure it, and I am sure that 
no one doubted my capacity for the com- 
mand more than I myself; but of this I 
have already said enough. 

There were many in and out of the Con- 
gress who preferred others. More than one 
of the Virginia delegation has been said to 
have been cool in the matter, and Mr. Ed- 
mund Pendleton was clear and full against 
my appointment. I have always taught 
myself never to resent opposition founded 
on honest beliefs or entertained by those 
of unblemished character. Colonel Madi- 
son once said to me that time is a great 
peacemaker, but I have rarely needed it. 
My breast never harboured a suspicion that 
the opposition then made was due to per- 
sonal unfriendliness, for no man could have 
had more reasonable doubt of my fitness 
than I myself. Nor have I ever permitted 
the remembrance to affect my actions, and 
I have lived to have unequivocal proofs of 
the esteem of some who most opposed me. 



XVIII 

I IKE all Virginians, I was disturbed dur- 
J ing this time by tlie news of the in- 
solence of the French on the frontier, and 
began to feel that my brother's money, put 
into the Ohio Company, was in peril, for 
we were like to be soon cooped up by a line 
of forts, and our trade in peltries was al- 
ready almost at an end, and about to pass 
into the hands of the French. We learned 
with pleasure that the royal governors were 
ordered to insist on the retirement of these 
overbusy French, who claimed all the land 
up to the Alleghanies, but I did not dream 
that I was soon to take part in the matter. 

About that time, or before, there had 
been much effort to secure the Six Nations 
of Indians as allies. One of their chiefs, 
Tanacharisson, known as the Half-King, be- 
cause of holding a subsidiary rule among 
the Indians, advised a fort to be built by us 
near to the Forks of the Ohio, on the east 

120 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 121 

bank, and Gist, the trader set out on this 
errand. A Captain Trent was charged to 
carry our King's message to the French out- 
posts ; but having arrived at Logstown, one 
hundred and fifty miles from his destina- 
tion, and hearing of the defeat of our allies, 
the Miamis, by the French, he lost heart 
and came back to report. The Ohio Com- 
pany at this time complained to the gov- 
ernor of the attacks on their traders, and 
this gentleman, being concerned both for 
his own pocket and for his Majesty's prop- 
erty, resolved to send some one of more 
spirit to bear the King's message ordering 
the French to retire and to cease to molest 
our fur traders about the Ohio. 

It was unfortunate that Governor Robert 
Dinwiddle, who was now eager to defend 
his interests in the Ohio Company, had lost 
the prudent counsel of its late head, my 
brother Lawrence. He would have made 
a better envoy than I, for at the age of 
twenty-one a man is too young to influence 
the Indians, on account of a certain rever- 
ence they have for age in council. I was 
ignorant of what was intended when I re- 
ceived orders to repair to Williamsburg. 
To my surprise, and I may say to my plea- 



122 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

sure, I learned that I was to go to Logs- 
town. I was there to meet our allies, the 
Indians, and secure from them an escort 
and guides, and so push on and find the 
French commander. I was to deliver to 
him my summons, and wait an answer dur- 
ing one week, and then to return. I was 
also to keep my eyes open as to all matters 
of military concern. 

Whatever distrust I had in regard to my 
powers as an envoy, I said nothing, for in 
case of an order a soldier has no alternative 
but to obey. Had I been in the governor's 
place I should have sent an older man. 

I received my credentials at Williams- 
burg, and rode away the day after, October 
31, 1753, intending no delay. 

Van Braam was assigned to me as my 
French interpreter, and I gathered my out- 
fit of provisions, blankets, and guns at Alex- 
andria, and horses, tents, and other needed 
matters at Winchester, and was joined near 
AVills Creek— where now is the settlement 
called Cumberland— by Mr. Gist and an In- 
dian interpreter, one Davidson. 

The same day, November 13, to my plea- 
sure. Lord Fairfax rode into camp and 
spent the night. It was raining and at times 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 123 

snowing, but Gist soon set up a lean-to, and 
with our feet to the fire we talked late into 
the night, his lordship smoking, as was his 
habit. 

I have many times desired to be able to 
make drawings of the greater trees, but, 
although I could plot a survey well, beyond 
this I could never go. I speak of this be- 
cause of my remembrance of that night, and 
how mighty the trees seemed by the camp- 
fire light around the clearing. It was his 
lordship who called my attention to the 
trees. He had a way, most strange to me, 
of suddenly dropping the matter in hand 
before it was fully considered. He would 
be silent a space and speak no more, or turn 
presently to another matter most remote. 
All of this I learned to accept without re- 
monstrance, out of respect for this great 
gentleman, as was fitting in one of my 
years. I never got accustomed to his ways, 
for it has been always my desire to deal 
with the subject in hand fully and to an 
end. Nor did I see this wilderness as his 
lordship saw it; for, while I made note of 
trees for what logs they would afford, and 
as to the soil and the lay of the land, his 
lordship I have seen stand for ten minutes 



124 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

looking at a great tree as though he found 
much to consider of it. In like manner I 
have seen him stop when the hounds were 
in full cry, a thing most astonishing, and 
sit still in the saddle, looking down at a 
brook or up at the sunrise. 

As we lay by the fire he remained without 
speaking for a long while, until the men, 
having found some old and dried birch logs, 
cast them on the fire, and a great roaring 
red flame lighted the woods and was blown 
about by the cold wind. His lordship said, 
' ' See, George, how the shadows of the trees 
are dancing "—a thing very wild, that I 
never should have much noticed had not 
he called on me to observe it. After this 
he was silent until suddenly he began to ask 
questions as to my men and my route, and 
what I meant to do and say in the French 
camps. At last he said, " You are going 
to stir up a nest of hornets," and, finally, 
that the former messenger, Trent, was a 
coward. 

When he had again been silent a long 
while, he said that this time, at least, he was 
not responsible for my appointment, and 
Dinwiddle was a fool to send a boy on a 
man's errand. This was my own opinion. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 125 

but I made no reply. At last lie filled liis 
pipe again, and called for a coal, and said, 
"But by George, George, you never were 
a boy, not since I knew you." I ventured 
to say that but for his former influence this 
oflSce would not have come to me. To this 
he made no answer, but bid me distrust 
every Indian, especially the Half-King, who 
was not treacherous but uncertain, and not 
less every Frenchman, and added that I was 
so young that they would think that I could 
be easily fooled. I said that might be an 
advantage, for I meant to see all there was 
to see, and had told Van Braam to keep his 
ears open. 

His lordship laughed, and said I might 
thank Heaven there were no women in the 
business, and with this, bidding me have 
the fire made up for the night, we lay down 
to sleep in the lean-to. 

I find it interesting now in my old age to 
discover myself thus able to recall, little by 
little, what his lordship said. I was pleased 
at the notice he took of me, but a lad, and 
lay long awake under the lean-to, thinking 
upon such counsels as his lordship had been 
pleased to give. 



XIX 

AS I turn over the diary in which I re- 
XjL corded my journey through this wil- 
derness, I find myself remembering many 
little incidents which I never set down. 

It rained or snowed almost daily. The 
rivers were swollen, so that we had to swim 
our horses, an art which soldiers should be 
taught. Although Van Braam much en- 
livened the way by his songs and very 
doubtful tales of his wars, I was very tired 
and my new buckskin coat in tatters when 
we arrived at the mouth of Turtle Creek on 
the Monongahela. There we found Frazier, 
a trader whom the French had driven out 
of the Indian town of Venango. With two 
canoes he lent me I sent our baggage down 
the Monongahela to the fork, where, with 
the Alleghany River, it joins the Ohio, and 
set out on a bad trail to meet them. 

We got to the Forks of the Ohio before 
the canoes. There, I settled in my mind, 

126 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 127 

was the place for a fort, nor could I better 
that judgment to-day. It came afterwards 
to be chosen by the French engineer Mer- 
cier to be Fort Duquesne. On the rise of 
ground we made camp, and paid a visit to 
Shingiss of the Delawares, who pretended 
to favour us, but proved later a savage foe. 

Gist insisted that he could tell from their 
faces how the Indians felt towards us, but 
to me they told nothing, and are in this re- 
spect unlike the faces of white men. 

We got to Logstown, fifteen miles down 
the Ohio, on November 24. Here I met the 
Indian known as the Half-King. He was 
angry at the French claims, and I did not 
too strongly put forward those of the King, 
which were not much better founded; but 
that was for my superiours to decide. I 
found him hard to satisfy, but if I spoke of 
the French he was at once angered, and 
eager to help. I watched with interest as 
he drew with charcoal on birch bark the 
plan of their forts at French Creek and on 
Lake Erie, while Davidson interpreted his 
words. 

The nearest way was impassable because 
of marshy savannas, and I found I must 
needs travel north so as to reach the lake. 



128. THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

by passing through Venango. This, the 
Half-King informed me, was five sleeps dis- 
tant, and expressed it by five times drawing 
up his hands, as a man does when pulling 
up his blankets before sleeping. 

It was fortunately arranged that the 
Half-King, White Thunder, and two more 
chiefs should go with me. It was but sev- 
enty miles to Venango, but the weather 
could not have been worse, and so it was 
December 4 before we rode into the clearing 
the French had made around the big log 
house out of which they had driven the 
trader John Frazier. 

I recall what is not set down in my diarj^ 
the anger and shame with which I saw the 
flag of France flying over the big cabin. 
As I came out of the woods, a lean, dark- 
faced man came forward with three French 
officers, and I learned that he was Captain 
Joncaire, the worst enemy we had, for he 
was a half-breed and had the tongues of 
the Indians. He said he had command on 
the Ohio, but we must push on to see his 
general. He was very merry, and laughed 
every minute or two, but was on his guard 
like the others. 

Three days passed before I could get 
away, with La Force, the guide they gave 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 129 

me, and three soldiers for escort. Mean- 
while Joncaire entertained us at a supper. 
I never had better cause to be thankful for 
my sobriety, which was a rare virtue at that 
day, and even later, among all classes. The 
big log cabin had a great table set out with 
game and French kickshaws, such as were 
strange to me. None of the French spoke 
English nor understood it, and of my 
people Van Braam alone had any French. 
They all dosed themselves freely with 
wine and brandy, and pretty soon the 
French felt it and began to give their 
tongues license and to brag and talk loosely. 
I was never more amused in all my life, for 
as Joncaire boasted of what they meant to 
do, Van Braam, who was an old soldier with 
a head used to potations, chattered what 
seemed to be a kind of French, which set 
the drunken fools a-laughing. Amid all the 
noise, and the smoke which nearly choked 
me. Van Braam now and then spoke to 
me, telling me what they said, and of their 
mind to seize and hold the country. Next 
day he was still more full as to their 
talk, and did me a service, which, in spite 
of the hurt he innocently did me later, I 
never forgot. 

I was glad to get away at last, for when 



130 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

Joncaire found the Half-King, who was hid 
away in my camp, which I had made in the 
woods at a distance, he got the poor savage 
drunk with rum and loaded him with gifts. 
Four days later, and very tired, I was at 
French Creek, where was a great fort, fif- 
teen miles from Lake Erie. Much against 
my will, Joncaire had sent with me La 
Force, as great a lover of mischief as could 
be found. This fellow was the leanest man 
I ever saw, and saddle-coloured. When he 
spoke to me he stared constantly, which is 
as unpleasant as to avoid entirely to meet 
a man's gaze. He made no end of trouble, 
and had later his reward, and perhaps more 
punishment than he deserved. 

I met at this station many educated 
French officers, such as I was to make wel- 
come at another time. I could not avoid 
to be pleased with the commandant, by 
name Legardeur de St. Pierre, a chevalier 
of St. Louis. He was an old soldier, very 
tall and straight, and with much grey hair, 
and had lost an eye in battle. This gentle- 
man was most courteous, and had brisk, 
pleasing waj^s, very frank and outspoken. 
He desired to be remembered to Lord Fair- 
fax, whom he had known in Paris long ago. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 131 

The chevalier, by good fortune, spoke 
English enough to make his company very 
agreeable, and I became sure, as I spent 
some days in his society, that he made no 
attempt to deceive me; for nothing could 
have been more plain than that he meant 
to hold the country for his king. 

He was pleased to relate his campaigns 
in Europe, and, although he was apt, like 
old soldiers, to be lengthy as to these, I 
found him to be instructive. 

He talked lightly of women, but so did 
his officers, and in a manner we in Virginia 
should have considered to be unmannerly 
or worse. Also he told me that the French 
encouraged their soldiers to take wives 
among the young squaws, a thing our peo- 
ple never inclined to do. He seemed to 
have known many English gentlemen who 
had been in Paris, and even why Lord Fair- 
fax had left England, all of which story I 
could have heard from him if I had thought 
proper so to do, which I did not. He did 
say, and was very merry about it, that if a 
woman drove his lordship to America, an- 
other might drive him back, for, after all, 
we were only shuttlecocks, and were knocked 
to and fro by the women— and I might say 



132 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

SO to his lordship with the chevalier's com- 
pliments. 

I remember that when, after this journey, 
I had returned home, my sister Betty was 
agreeably interested to hear what the cheva- 
lier had said of the old lord, who was the 
only person who could keep Betty quiet for 
five minutes. I had to answer that I had 
not seen fit to inquire further. Upon this 
she declared that some day she should ask 
his lordship all about it. When I laughed 
and made no other reply, she declared that 
I was as silent as my lord, and that I had 
lost a fine opportunity. I contented myself 
with the chevalier's compliments to Lord 
Fairfax, who said if that was all the old 
fellow had said he must have changed, for 
he was a gossiping old reprobate and fit to 
corrupt me. But for my part I liked him 
and found him a gallant gentleman, and 
only of a mind to serve his king, as I was 
to serve mine. 

There was no unreasonable delay, for the 
chevalier made clear to me that nothing 
could be done until after they had held a 
council. I arrived on the 12th, and on the 
14th they were able to give me a sealed reply 
to the governor's summons. Meanwhile I 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 138 

had been left free to inspect the fort and 
count the canoes made ready for use in the 
spring. I must admit that they seemed care- 
less as to what I saw. There were many In- 
dians and French and half-breeds coming 
and going. The fort was square, of logs, 
with palisadoes, a forge, and a chapel, all 
very neat and clean, and much ceremony 
when we came in and went out. 



I WAS now very eager to go, but notwith- 
standing the polite ways of the com- 
mandant, I found needless delays as to 
guides and supplies. This was to gain time 
to win the Half-King, who was of our side 
to-day, and the next had what the Indians 
call **two hearts." I cannot say that ever 
in my life I suffered as much anxiety as I 
did in this affair. The Half-King, being 
half drunk, assured me the chevalier was 
keeping him. That officer swore that he 
was ignorant why we did not go, but this 
I determined not to do without Tanacha- 
risson. One day a gun was promised the 
savage, another day all my sachems were 
dead drunk. I was in despair, for to lose 
the Half-King to the wiles of the French 
would be a serious matter, and I was re- 
solved not to fail. But here was T, a lad of 
twenty-one, playing a game with old, astute 
men for the prize of a drunken Indian ! 

134 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 135 

Finally Gist succeeded in keeping him 
sober a day, and yet, as he said, reasonably 
intoxicated with promises of great gifts; 
and so at last, on December 16, we gladly 
bade farewell and set out in our birch 
canoes to go down French Creek. 

A cannon was fired, and the officers as- 
sembled on shore saluted us politely as we 
left the fort. The commandant sent one 
canoe loaded with strong liquors to be used 
on the way, and at Venango to overcome the 
wits of Tanacharisson. 

Each of us, Gist and Van Braam and 
Davidson, was seated very comfortably in 
the middle of a canoe of birch bark ; at the 
bow and stern were Indians or half-breeds, 
and, as the water was very rapid most of the 
way, they used poles of ash to hold and 
guide the canoes. On the 18th December 
we were no longer comfortable. The ice 
was thick, and we had all of us to wade and, 
in places, to portage. On the 22d we came 
to a strong rapid. Gist advised to land and 
portage the provisions. This we did, and, 
being arrived before the French canoes, 
stood to watch them descend, a fine sight. 
About half-way the man on the bow of one 
canoe— that with the liquors— caught his 



136 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

pole between two rocks. He should have 
let it go ; but as he did not, the boat slued 
square to the stream and, filling, turned 
over, so that all the brandy was lost, to my 
satisfaction. The men got out, with no 
great ease, swearing oaths, both French and 
Indian. 

It rained and froze, and when, at fall of 
night, we came to Venango on December 
22, we were cased in ice like men in armour. 
I was never more glad of a fire. 

Here Captain Chabert de Joncaire set to 
work again to convince my Half-King with 
the bottle. But by good luck the sachem 
was much disordered in his stomach because 
of the rum he had of St. Pierre, and when 
Gist persuaded him the French had be- 
witched the liquor, he would none of it. 
Here we found our horses, but very lean, 
and, after a rest, set out by land from Ve- 
nango, over a bad trail, this being about 
December 25. 

It was a horrible journey, the men get- 
ting frozen feet and the packhorses failing, 
until, in despair at the delay, on the third 
day, against Gist's advice, I left Van 
Braam to follow me with the horses and 
men, and determined to strike through the 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 137 

woods by compass to the Forks of the Ohio, 
and thus be enabled the sooner to report to 
the governor. 

For this venture Gist and I put on match- 
coats, Indian dress, thick socks, and mocca- 
sins. We carried packs, with my papers 
tied up in tanned skin, and as much provi- 
sion as we could manage. With our guns, 
and thus cumbered, we left the camp and 
struck out through the woods, where to 
move by compass is no easy matter, be- 
cause to go straight is not possible where 
every tree and bit of swamp must turn a 
man to this side or that. But by taking 
note of some great pine in front of us, and, 
on reaching it, of another, we made good 
progress, and for part of the way we had 
an Indian trail. 

On the third day, the snow being deep, 
we struck up the southeast fork of Beaver 
Creek. Here were a few Indians camped, 
who seemed to expect us, but how they 
could have done this I never laiew; but 
there is much about Indian ways of commu- 
nication of which I must confess myself 
ignorant. 

They were too curious to please Gist ; but 
as we were now in midwinter, and to pass 



138 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

through a wilderness with no trails, we en- 
gaged, for we could do no better, an Indian 
as guide and to carry my pack. Gist mis- 
trusted him, and I soon shared his opinion. 

We left at break of day, and after ten 
miles were in doubt as to our route, I with 
one foot chafed and the most tired I ever 
was in my life, on account of plunging 
through drifts, where, on his snow-shoes, 
the Indian was at ease. At this time he 
would have carried my gun, but I refused. 
AVhen we said we would camp and rest, he 
declared the Ottawas would see our fire- 
smoke and surprise us. Upon this we kept 
on, as he said, toward his cabin. Once he 
told Gist he heard whoops, and then a gun, 
and kept turning northward, to our discon- 
tent. 

Notwithstanding my fatigue, I found the 
loneliness and silence of these woods to my 
taste, being open and free of undergrowth. 
I was startled at times by the sharp crack, 
like a pistol-shot, of huge limbs breaking, 
but there was no other sound. 



XXI 

AT last I declared that I must camp at 
- the first brook we met, and so kept on, 
stumbling, and ready to fall down with 
fatigue. At this time, being come some two 
miles farther into warm sunlight and an 
open glade, all the brighter for the white- 
ness of the snow, I came to a stand and 
said, ''Here is our stream; let us camp." 
iVt this time Gist and I were near together, 
and the Indian about twenty paces away. 
Of a sudden he turned and fired at us. I 
cried out to Gist if he was shot. He said 
no, and we ran in on the fellow before he 
could load, and seized him and took his 
gun. Gist was for killing him at once, but 
this I would not allow, and we contented 
ourselves with taking his gun, and made 
him walk on in front. Gist, who was much 
vexed, said if we did not shoot him, which 
was the better way, we must contrive to 
fool him. At last it was agreed to pretend 

139 



140 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

we believed his excuses as to tlie shooting 
being an accident, and to let him go to his 
cabin. He said he knew we would never 
trust him further, and was pleased to be 
told he might go home and get some jerked 
venison ready, and that we would camp 
that night and follow his tracks in the snow 
at morning. We returned his gun, but took 
all his powder. We gave him a cake of 
bread, and Gist followed him until he had 
gone a mile. After my companion came 
back to me, we moved on rapidly for an 
hour and made a big fire, and, as it was 
night, took, by the light of the blaze, a 
course by compass, and set out, leaving, to 
my regret, the great warm flame behind us. 

It was now clear and very cold. All night 
long we pushed on, now and then making a 
light with flint and steel to see the compass, 
and trying to observe the stars. We were 
well assured that we should be pursued, 
and on this account never halted the next 
day, and hardly spoke a word until, at 
evening, we came upon the x^lleghany 
River. 

There we made camp, and were up at 
break of day. 

The ice lay out some sixty feet from the 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 141 

two shores, and between were masses of 
ice afloat and a great flow of water. Hav- 
ing only one hatchet, and that not very 
good, we were all day contriving to build 
a raft. At sundown we pushed it over the 
shore ice and got afloat. Midway we got 
caught in the jam of ice-cakes, and as I 
pushed with mj^ setting-pole, the swift cur- 
rent and a block of ice caught it, and I was 
cast into the deep water. I caught on to 
a log of the raft, and Gist giving me a hand, 
I crawled on to the raft. I had lost my 
pole, and to go to either shore was not pos- 
sible, and when we drifted on to an island 
I was thankful enough, and the raft swept 
away in the flood. 

Very soon Gist had a great fire burning, 
and by this I dried myself; but to keep 
warm was impossible, for the cold was the 
greatest I have ever known, and so intense 
was it that Gist would not allow me to sleep, 
but made me walk about, although I was 
ready to drop, saying if we slept and the 
fire should die, so should we. By good for- 
tune there was a large jam of drifted wood 
on the upper end of the island, and thus 
we had fuel sufficient. 

What with fatigue and the cold increas- 



142 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

ing as the night went on, even Gist, who 
was of great endurance and hopeful, was 
concerned lest we should have been fol- 
lowed, and, as the island afforded small 
shelter, be shot from the shore. This trou- 
bled me less than to keep warm, for there 
was not snow enough to build a hut, than 
which there is no better shelter. 

About ten o'clock that night we found 
that the river was rising, so that it would 
take little more to flood us, ^^^at I found 
worst of all was the delay. I said things 
could hardly be worse, but that the cold 
was such as would freeze the river by day- 
light. He said that was true, and we went 
back to the fire and shared a part of a flask 
of brandy St. Pierre gave me. Fortunately 
we had food enough. Gist kept me and 
himself awake with amazing stories of In- 
dians and French, and of great bears. But, 
contrive as we could, Gist had his toes froze, 
and had to have them rubbed with snow to 
save them. I was well pleased at last to see 
red in the sky to eastward, and when we 
found the ice-cakes froze hard together we 
made haste to cross to the shore. There, 
being out of shot and the sun warmer every 
minute, we built another fire and ate break- 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 143 

fast, and took, each in turn, an hour's 
sleep. 

As we walked away, Gist said there was 
small fear of Indians either in the darkness 
or in great cold, for they liked neither, and 
he thought the cold had perhaps saved us 
from pursuit. 

This was the case at Valley Forge in 
'78, when, although my soldiers suffered 
greatly, the snows and the cold were such 
as to keep Sir William Howe in his lines. 

From the top of a hill, as I looked back 
on the river, Gist said: "You will never 
again, sir, be in a worse business than that, 
nor ever see the like again." But this I 
did, when, on the night before Christmas, 
in 1776, I crossed the Delaware in a boat 
with General Knox, amid as great peril of 
ice, on our way to beat up the Hessian quar- 
ters at Trenton. 

While we were in danger, Gist had been 
silent ; but now that we were released from 
anxiety and on a clear trail, he talked all 
the time, whether I made answer or not. 
I remember little of what he said, being 
engaged in thinking how soon I should be 
able to reach Williamsburg. I recall, how- 
ever, his surprising me with a question as 



144 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

to whether I had ever before had a man 
shoot at me. I said never, and having my 
mind thus turned to the matter, felt it to 
be strange that so great an escape and such 
nearness to death had not more impressed 
me. But, in fact, I had no time to think 
before we caught the man, and after that 
the great misery of the cold so distressed 
me that how to keep warm employed my 
mind. 



XXII 

WE were now on a good trail, and by 
nightfall came to the cabin of Fra- 
zier, a trader in furs; and this was where 
the Turtle Creek falls into the Mononga- 
hela. Here I wrote up my diary. 

As there was hope of packhorses coming 
hither which might be used on our return, 
I waited, pleased to be fed and warmed, 
but hearing bad news of massacres by the 
Ottawas. Near by I visited the Queen Ali- 
quippa, and made her presents of a match- 
coat and a bottle of rum I had of the trader, 
asking, too, her advice as to the Indians, all 
of which pleased her mightily. 

I was surprised to find a woman with rule 
over Indians, but she was said to be wise 
in council. I never heard of a King Ali- 
quippa. The queen was old and fat and 
as wrinkled as a frosted persimmon. She 
smoked a pipe and had a tomahawk in 
her belt, and I did not think she would 

10 145 



146 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

be a comfortable partner in the marriage 
state. 

At last, as we failed at this place to get 
horses after a three days' rest, we left on 
foot, January 1, reaching Gist's home on 
the Monongahela, a sixteen-mile tramp. 
There I left Gist, and, buying a horse, 
pushed on, passing packhorses carrying 
stores for the new fort begun at the Forks. 

I had no more appetite for adventure, 
and was glad to reach Williamsburg on 
January 16, 1754, where I delivered my 
sealed reply, and conveyed to the governor 
my views, and remembrance of what I had 
seen and heard, with maps I had made and 
drawings of the forts. 

Looking back from the hilltoi?, as Gen- 
eral Hamilton once said to me, must often 
surprise a man with knowledge of mistakes 
made hj the way ; but considering this jour- 
ney from the summit of j^ears, I seem to 
have done as well as so young a man might. 

Van Braam, who came in later, told me 
that the elder French officers were rather 
amused that a boy should be sent on an 
errand which might bring about a war. I 
think it was their imprudent indifference 
which left me free to observe all I wished 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 147 

to learn which might bear upon military 
action in the future. It appeared to me that 
they felt so secure of their own power as to 
be altogether careless. 

I proposed to myself on starting to be 
as full of wiles as the Indians, and to be 
very careful as to what I said to them and 
to the French. I perceive to-day that my 
disposition to look down on the Indians was 
a mistake, and that I had been wiser to have 
treated the Half-King more as an equal. 
My disposition to be what is called diplo- 
matic with the French in command was 
needless, for the commander was very 
frank. I have learned, as years went by, 
that in treating with men or nations the 
simplest way is the best. 

The answer made to the governor was 
plain enough. The Frenchmen were there 
to obey orders, and meant to hold the lands. 
They would, of course, send our summons 
to Marquis Duquesne. The chevalier said 
in his despatch polite words of me, which 
I still recall with satisfaction, for I have 
never been insensible to the approbation of 
men, and the words of the courteous French 
officer were not lost upon me. 

The governor thought, and so did his 



148 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

council, that the answer was evasive and 
was meant to gain time. It seemed to me 
remarkably straightforward, and I was sure 
that in the spring they would descend the 
Ohio and take possession. I had to prepare 
my report hastily in two days, which was 
printed and distributed through the colo- 
nies. It appears to me, as I read it over, 
to have been well done for so young a man, 
with no time allowed to correct and im- 
prove the language. I am more surprised, 
as I now read it, that I should have had the 
good sense to see, as the French engineers 
saw later, that where the Monongahela and 
Alleghany join was the best place for a fort, 
and a better than where the Ohio Company 
intended. 

It seems strange to me, as I look back on 
this time, to see what share I, but a young 
man, had in the historical events of the day. 
My report was not only read throughout 
the colonies, but in England and even in 
France, so that at this time, and again soon 
after, my name became known both among 
ourselves and on the other side of the ocean, 
although the matters in which I was en- 
gaged were in themselves, to appearance, of 
little moment. To be so widely spoken of 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON, 149 

was not then unpleasant, and the less so 
because it was a source of gratification to 
my friends. 

I had been through the winter wilderness 
and delivered the hostile message of the 
King's governor. It was seemingly no great 
matter. But as I reflect, I perceive that 
whatever 1 did then or later gave me such 
importance in the eyes of men as led on to 
my being considered for the greater tasks 
of life. Mr. J — , who much disliked Gen- 
eral H , once wrote of him that he was 

like a pawn in the game of chess, and was 
pushed on by mere luck, until he suddenly 
found himself on the far line of the board 
with the powers of royalty. This was said 
with bitterness not long ago, when I in- 
sisted he should command under me, at the 
time we were threatened with a French war. 
I am not, however, of the opinion that good 
fortune alone presides over the destinies 
either of men or nations, for often in after 
days I have had cause to believe that an in- 
tending Providence was concerned in the 
events of the great war. 

As soon as I had made an end of my 
business with the governor, I visited my 
mother, and thence rode to Mount Vernon. 



150 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

There I found Lord Fairfax, and was 
pleased to be rested and to hear his lord- 
ship speak well of my conduct of a difficult 
affair. When we were alone next day on 
horseback, he rode long in silence, as was 
his way. "When he spoke he said : ' ^ George, 
I have sent for copies of your report to 
send to my friends in England. It is well 
done. I am pleased that you would not talk 
much of it last night to Colonel Willis and 
Mr. Warner. The men who do not talk 
about themselves are the most talked about 
by others. Silence often insures praise." 
Indeed, even thus early and since, I have 
been averse to speak of what T had done. 
I replied that I should remember his lord- 
ship's advice, upon which he went on to 
talk of the chances of war with France. I 
was not left long idle. 



XXIII 

THE governor was now fully decided to 
resist the French aggressions, and 
convened the House of Burgesses after 
much delay. I was offered full command 
of a force of three hundred men in six 
companies, forming a regiment. I con- 
sulted his lordship and my half-brother Au- 
gustine as to this, and not feeling secure of 
my fitness for so great a position, and they 
agreeing, I chose rather to sei^e as second 
under Colonel Frye. This being settled, I 
went about the business of recruiting as 
lieutenant-colonel. 

In considering the new duty to which I 
was called and what it led me to do, I have 
asked myself whether I could have done 
it better, considering the want of' supplies 
and of sufficiency of men. 

Mr. John Langdon at one time wrote fo 
me, when commenting on the character of 
General A , that what he had been as 

151 



152 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

a very young man be continued to be ever 
after, and tbat, altbougb education and op- 
portunity migbt give a man of strong char- 
acter the tools for bis purjooses, tbey would 
not seriously alter bis nature; be would 
only be more and more tbat wbicb be bad 
been. 

As I sit in judgment upon tbe particu- 
lars wbicb occasioned tbe affair at Great 
Meadows, and later my disaster at Fort Ne- 
cessity, I am inclined to believe tbat I could 
bave done no better at fift}^ tban I did at 
twenty-two. I perceive also tbat tbe con- 
ditions wbicb at that time surrounded and 
embarrassed me were on a lesser scale tbe 
same as those with wbicb I bad to struggle 
in tbe later and more important days, which 
made me old before my time. Such com- 
parisons as these do not readily occur to 
me, as I am inclined to dwell most upon the 
needs of the present and upon tbe possibili- 
ties wbicb tbe future may have in store. 

On one occasion, during the march to 
Yorktown, when bivouacked at the bead of 
tbe Elk, Colonel Scammel and Lieutenant- 
Colonel Hugh Wynne, both at tbat time of 
my military family, led me into expressing 
myself as to these earlier events, and one of 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 153 

them, Lieutenant-Colonel Wynne, I think, 
remarked that I had then to encounter the 
same kind of obstacles as those which had 
perplexed me at the Valley Forge and Mor- 
ristown, and indeed throughout the War of 
Independency, I did not encourage such 
further discussion by these young officers as 
might readily lead on to the impropriety of 
criticisms upon Congress. But now, recall- 
ing what was then said, I am led to see how 
remarkably alike were the conditions I had 
to meet at two periods of my life. Nor can 
I fail to observe that what General Hamil- 
ton liked very often to call "the education 
of events" was valuable in teaching me 
moderation and such control of temper as 
I was to need on a larger field. 

While I went about my military prepara- 
tions, the governor and the House wrangled 
over the ten thousand pounds he asked for 
the fitting out of troops. I have observed 
that men engaged in agriculture as the mas- 
ters of slaves acquire a great independence 
of thought and are hard to move to a com- 
mon agreement even when, as at that time, 
there is an immediate need for united 
action. 

There was also much distrust of Gover- 



154 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

nor Dinwiddie, and indeed we rarely sub- 
mitted with entire good will to any of the 
royal governors. He got his grant at last, 
but a committee was to confer with him as 
to how it was to be used— a measure not 
altogether unwise, but which made him 
swear we were getting to be too republican 
and, he feared, would be more and more dif- 
ficult to be brought to order. 

As to my recruiting, the better men were 
indisposed to join, and I got chiefly a vaga- 
bond crew of shoeless, half-dressed fellows, 
but most of them hunters and good shots. 
I did better when the governor offered a 
bounty in land, which as yet we had not, for 
it was to be about the fine bottoms at the 
Forks of the Ohio, which were in the hands 
of the French and the Indians. 

I made Van Braam a captain, and there- 
after obtained more men and better, for the 
old warrior promised, I fear, an easy time 
and all manner of agreeable rewards, with 
such accounts of the lands they were to 
have as much delighted the hard-working 
farmers' sons. 

On April 2 I left Alexandria, with orders 
to secure tools and build roads, for Colonel 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 155 

Frye to follow me with the artillery and a 
greater force. 

In what I was thus set to do I knew I 
was to have difficulty, and this it was hard 
to make Governor Dinwiddle understand, 
nor do I think he or our rulers in England 
could form any idea of the country to be 
traversed, even up to the Forks of the Ohio. 
From our outlying farms westward to the 
Mississippi was a great forest land with 
savannas, and beyond the Ohio vast mea- 
dows where butfalo grazed. Through our 
own hills there were old Indian trails, and 
as far as to the Ohio were horse-paths used 
by the traders and their men. There were 
also many crossing-trails made by horned 
game to reach water, and apt to mislead 
any but men accustomed to the woods. 
Very few knew this mighty wilderness, nor 
was it easy to make persons unused to the 
woods comprehend the obstacles and risks 
an army would find on traversing them with 
waggons and artillery. 

As I have said, I had long ago fixed upon 
the Forks of the Ohio as an excellent sta- 
tion for a fort. The French were also of 
this opinion, and in their hands it became 



156 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

at last Fort Duquesne, and in 1759 was 
lightly given up by them to General Forbes. 
At this earlier date our governor, resolving 
to take my advice, made choice of Captain 
Trent to build a fort at the Forks, where we 
prepared to follow and support him. Hav- 
ing failed on a former and easier errand, it 
was foolish to have expected better things 
of this man in a more difficult matter. He 
was given only fifty men, as it was supposed 
he would not be attacked. 

While I was on my way to Wills Creek 
from Winchester, Contrecoeur dropped 
down-stream from Venango with a great 
force and took the half-finished fort, Cap- 
tain Trent being absent at the time. I was 
near to Wills Creek when I learned of this 
disaster. Colonel Frye and other detach- 
ments were to follow me, but I saw that 
we were now in a way to be devoured in 
bits by the larger French forces. Every- 
thing I needed was lacking. I had been 
cursed along the border for my taking of 
waggons, horses, and food, and when I 
would have picks, shovels, and axes, it was 
worse. 

I heard while here from Mr. Fairfax, de- 
siring me not to neglect having divine serv- 
ice in the camps for the benefit of the 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 157 

Indians. I did on one occasion, but as 
Davidson told me they considered it some 
form of incantation, I did not repeat it. I 
had also a letter from my mother, meant 
to have found me earlier. It seemed 
strange amid anxieties like mine to be asked 
to send her a good Dutch servant and, if 
I remember correctly, four pounds of 
good Dutch butter, I had far other busi- 
ness. 

At the Ohio Company's post at Wills 
Creek, nothing was ready; only Captain 
Trent, full of excuses for the failure of 
horses and boats, and much cast down at 
the news of the loss of the fort. I sent 
back for waggons and horses sixty miles to 
Winchester, and waited as patiently as I 
could. 

On April 23 came the men of Trent's 
party, released by the French. The ensign, 
Mr. Ward, was the only officer with them, 
and to surrender was all he could do. He 
told me of hundreds of Chippewas and Ot- 
tawas coming to join Contrecoeur, and of 
another force descending the Ohio. To add 
to my troubles, Trent's men were disor- 
derly, making my men uneasy by their 
stories. 

At this time I was decently housed in a 



158 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

small log hut, and here, retiring by myself, 
I fell to thinking of what I had heard and 
what I ought to do. The situation de- 
manded serious consideration, but also 
speedy action. 



XXIV 

I HAD been sent forward to build bridges, 
to corduroy swamps for the cannon, and 
to make roads. I was not to bring on hos- 
tilities, but I was to assert the King's title 
and, at need, to resist the French. The or- 
ders were well fitted to get me into trouble, 
but the capture of Trent's fort and men 
somewhat aided my decision, for this was 
an act of open war. While thus occupied, 
a runner fetched me letters, and among 
them one from Lord Fairfax. 

As adjutant of the Northern Division 
since I was nineteen, I was prepared for 
much that his lordship's letter conveyed, 
but it went in some respects beyond what 
I then knew or was prejoared for, and, I may 
add also, much beyond the views which 
his lordship came later to entertain, when 
men were obliged to elect as between loy- 
alty to the King and disloyalty to human 
rights. . 

159 



160 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

This letter now before me runs as fol- 
lows: 

Greemvay Court. 

My dear George : Yours received from Alex- 
andria, and thank you for the attention when 
you were so busily engaged. I am always pleased 
to be acquainted with anything to your advan- 
tage, and was gratified at your being chosen to be 
of the force. I desire you, however, to under- 
stand that your worst enemies will not be the 
French, or the fickle Indians, but those in the 
rear. 

There is of late years a great desire for free- 
dom in all the colonies, and men are disposed 
to dispute the too royal sense of prerogative 
on the part of the governors. Whenever, as 
now, money is to be voted, the houses in the 
several colonies are apt to use the occasion to 
dispute it, and to bargain for something else as a 
reward for their grant of supplies. The with- 
holding of money has been the chief means of 
governing kings by our own Commons. I blame 
it not. But this present reluctance is without 
cause— foolish, and at a wrong season. As to 
the difficulty of disciplining our people you know 
enough, and will know more ; but they will 
always fight, which may console for other de- 
fects. The want of an organized commissary 
you will feel of a surety, but less than with regu- 
lars, who do not know as do our people how to 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 161 

diet their English bellies, or how to forage at 
need on wood and river. Prepare, too, for de- 
sertion and drunkenness, which is the curse of 
the land. But I must forbear, lest I discourage 
you, although that I consider not to be easy. I 
would that you smoked a pipe. It confers great 
equanimity in times of doubt, and the Indians 
hold it to be helpful in council ; for while a man 
smokes he cannot discourse, aud thus must needs 
obtain time for sober reflection, for which reason 
it would be well that women took to the pipe, 
a custom which would greatly conduce to com- 
fort in the condition of armed neutrality known 
as the married state. Charles Sedley once said 
in my company that the pipe was the bachelor's 
hearth, and I have found it a good one. Indeed, 
my dear George, when I reflect upon the many 
statues of worthless kings and the monuments to 
scoundrels in graveyards where the dead lie and 
the living lie about them, I am inclined to set up 
a fine memorial at Greenway Court to the un- 
known Indian who invented this blessing of the 
Pipe. He must have been a great genius. 

Wishing you the best of luck, and that I were 
young enough to be with you, I am. 

Yours, 
Fairfax. 

P. S. You will at some time have to serve 

with regulars or with colonial officers appointed 

by the crown. Your sense of justice and of what 
11 



162 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

is due to a gentleman will, I am assured, revolt at 
the want of parity in pay and at otlier claims to 
outrank gentlemen of the colonies serving in the 
militia. As to this I counsel moderation and en- 
durance. Your first duty must be to the crown. 

F. 

It was raining heavily as I sat that night 
and considered what I should do. To fall 
back I had no mind. I had been set to the 
slow work of j)reparing roads, and had 
made them up to the west branch of the 
Youghiogheny, about four miles a day, and 
here meant to make a bridge. As I sat in 
the log cabin alone, deciding what next to 
do, came in Van Braam with a warning 
from the Half-King, and, just after, a 
trader who had been driven out by the 
French and who told me that a force sent 
from Duquesne was at least eight hundred 
in number. This I was sure could not be 
the case, and until I knew more I could not 
decide what to do. I asked to be alone, and 
with a candle and a rude map considered 
the situation. I concluded that the French 
would make no considerable move forward 
until they had made secure the excellent 
position they had taken from Trent. I was 
of opinion they would meanwhile send out 
small parties to scout. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 163 

After a council with my officers, we re- 
solved to go on to fortify a post of the Ohio 
Company at Redstone Creek, near the 
Monongahela, and after sending back ur- 
gent letters we set out, doing the best we 
could as to the road. On May 9, at Little 
Meadows, we were met by many traders, 
driven in by the French, with tales which 
much discouraged my men— in all some two 
hundred; and still I pushed on to the 
Youghiogheny, and there kept the men busy 
with the bridging of it. Leaving them oc- 
cupied in this manner, I explored the 
Youghiogheny for a better way by water 
than over the hills, but found it impracti- 
cable, and so came back to do as best I 
could with the road over the mountains. 

That night I was again called on for a 
decision. I remember I walked to and fro, 
considering how it was but an outpost, with 
nothing near in the way of succour, and be- 
fore me the French and the wilderness. 

Van Braam, whom I had sent out to 
scout, had before this appeared, bringing 
news that, eighteen miles below, the French 
were crossing by a ford, their number un- 
known; also that several of our men had 
deserted and that there was much uneasi- 
ness in the camp. I was myself quite un- 



164 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

easy enough. Many times since I have 
been in as doubtful and perilous situations, 
where the fate of an empire was concerned, 
but then I have had with me officers of dis- 
tinction. I was alone, hardly more than a 
boy, and surrounded by men who were be- 
coming alarmed. 

I said to Van Braam that we must not be 
caught here, but that I would not fall back 
very far. The old trooper smiled, and I 
confess to having been pleased by this sign 
of approval. My mind was made up not to 
return to the settlements except before an 
overwhelming force. 



XXV 

ON May 23, six more men being gone 
away, I retreated to Great Meadows, 
a wide, open space free of large trees, a 
charming place for an encounter, and here 
I cleared the ground of bushes, began a log 
fort, and prepared to remain until I heard 
further. This I did very soon, for Gist, the 
trader, came in on the 25th of May with 
news of my old acquaintance. La Force, 
having been at his camp, at noon the day 
before, with some fifty men, and one, De 
Jumonville, in command. They were fool- 
ish enough not to hold Gist, for he got off 
and warned me of their being not five miles 
from us. They had been sending runners 
back to Contrecoeur, and what were their 
intentions Gist did not know. That night I 
got news of my doubtful Half-King, who 
promised help if I would attack this party. 
Whatever indecision I have had in my life 
of warfare has been due to a too great re- 
spect for the opinions of other officers, and 

165 



166 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

very often I had done better to have gone 
my own way. All day long I had been in 
the melancholic state of mind which at 
times all my life has troubled me. I re- 
member that the news from Gist of this 
prowling band so near as five miles, and 
the word sent by the Half-King, at once put 
to rout my lowness of mind. Usually young 
officers go into their first battle under more 
experienced guidance, and I now wonder 
at the confidence with which I set out, for 
some of my officers were clear against it. 

I felt sure that De Jumonville would at- 
tack me if I retreated, or, if I let him alone, 
would wait for further help and orders from 
Contrecceur before making an end of my lit- 
tle party. That I was to strike openly the 
forces of the King of France did not dis- 
turb me, after their seizure of our fort at 
the Forks. 

When I told Van Braam and Gist what I 
meant to do, the former approved, but Gist 
would have had me retreat to Wills Creek. 
I said no ; we would surely be ambushed, 
and the men were deserting. 

Having given my orders, I tied an extra 
pair of moccasins to my belt, and taking 
no gun myself, set out at 10 p.m., leaving 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 167 

behind me a baggage-guard. I took with 
me forty men, the best I had, and mostly 
good shots. The Half-King and a few war- 
riors in full war-paint met me at a spring 
some two miles away. 

His scouts had found the French in a 
rocky valley, where they had cleared a space 
and evidently meant to await orders or re- 
inforcements. 

The rain was pouring down in torrents, 
the worst that could be, when we met the 
Half-King. We halted in the darkness of 
the forest while my interpreter let me know 
the situation of De Jumonville, which 
seemed to me to be well chosen as a hid- 
ing-place, but ill contrived for defence. 
After this w^e pushed on, the Indian guides 
being ahead. Several times they lost their 
way. We stumbled on in the wet woods, 
falling against one another, so dark was 
the night, and crawling under or over the 
rotten trees of a windfall. I was both eager 
and anxious, and kept on in front, or at 
times fell back to silence my men. We were 
moving so slowly that my anxiety contin- 
ually increased, and I had constantly to 
warn my men to keep their flint-locks dry. 

At last, toward dawn of day, we came 



168 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

where we could look down on the camp. 
The wind being in our faces, we had smelt 
the smoke of their fires a quarter of a mile 
away, and now and then, even at this dis- 
tant day, the smell of the smoke from wet 
wood smouldering in the rain recalls to 
my mind this night, a fact which appears to 
me singular. To my joy, the camp was si- 
lent and there were no sentinels. I halted 
the men, and my orders were whispered 
down the trail for them to scatter to the 
right while the Indians moved to the left. 
After giving time for this, I moved out 
alone from the shelter of the rocks and trees. 
As I did so, a man came from a hut and 
gave a great shout. At once the French 
were out with their arms and began to fire, 
but had no cover. Some of my own men 
were practised Indian-fighters and kept to 
the shelter of the trees, moving from trunk 
to trunk and firing very deliberately. I 
heard the enemy's bullets whizz around me, 
and felt at once and for the first time in 
war the strange exhilaration of danger. A 
man fell at my side, and I called to those 
near me to keep to the trees, but did not 
myself fall back, feeling it well to encourage 
my men. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 169 

For a little while the firing was hot. It 
lasted, however, but fifteen minutes. Then 
I saw an officer fall, and they gave up and 
cried for quarter as I ran down into their 
camp to stop the Indians from using their 
tomahawks and killing the wounded. 

Van Braam told me afterwards that I 
exposed myself needlessly, but I thought 
this was necessary in order to give spirit 
and confidence to men who were many of 
them new to battle. 

Our loss was small and that of the French 
great, since De Jumonville, who was in 
command, and ten men were killed and 
twenty-two taken, with some others hurt. 

I remember to have written my brother 
Jack of this little fight, that the whistle of 
the bullets was pleasing to me; but I was 
then very young, and it was, after all, but 
a way of saying that the sense of danger, 
or risk, was agreeable. 

On our way back through the woods I 
talked to La Force, who was in no wise cast 
down and told me that I should pay dear 
for my success, and how innocent they were, 
and a fine string of lies. 

I was very well pleased to have caught 
this fellow, one of the most wily and trou- 



170 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

blesome half-breeds on the frontier, and a 
fine maker of mischief, as he had been when 
I was on my way to the lake. 

After the fight we found, on the person 
of De Jumonville and in his hut, papers 
amply proving his hostile intention, al- 
though even without this evidence his hid- 
ing so long in our neighbourhood, and 
sending out runners to Fort Duquesne, suffi- 
ciently showed what my party had to ex- 
pect when the French would be reinforced. 

After the fight it was thought prudent 
to return as soon as possible, so, to my 
regret, I had to leave the dead, both our 
own and the French, without decent burial. 
This I believe they had later at the hand 
of De Villiers. Although the fugitives were 
nearly all taken, one or two escaped and 
took the news to Contrecceur, at the Forks 
of the Ohio. I sent my prisoners to Wil- 
liamsburg under a strong guard, having 
previously supplied M. Drouillon, a young 
officer, and La Force with clothes of my 
own out of the very little I had. I remem- 
ber that I was amused when Drouillon, a 
pert little fellow, complained that my shirt 
was too big for him. Indeed, it came down 
near to his ankles. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 171 

I asked of the governor in a letter such 
respect and favour for these persons as 
was due to gentlemen placed in their unfor- 
tunate condition. Neither of them seemed 
to me to have been aware of the character 
of their commander's orders. To my re- 
gret, the request I made to Governor Din- 
widdle received small consideration, as I 
may have to relate. I was of opinion, how- 
ever, that La Force should not be set free 
too soon, because of his power to influence 
the Indians. 



XXVI 

THE action with De Jumonville took 
place on May 28, and the Half-King, 
although disappointed as to scalps, went 
away, promising to return with many war- 
riors. He told me his friends the English 
had now at last begun in earnest, but that 
it was no good war to keep prisoners. 

As I trusted him more than most of the 
Indians, I sent thirty men and some horses 
to assist in moving the Indian families, for 
without them the warriors would never re- 
turn ; and I did not neglect to send a runner 
back to hasten Mackay, who was in com- 
mand of an independent company from 
South Carolina. They were indeed quite 
independent, having neither good sense nor 
discipline, as I was soon to discover. My 
little skirmish with the French on May 28 
added to my perj)lexities the knowledge that 
as soon as the runners who escaped should 
reach the fort at the Forks Contrecoeur 

172 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 173 

would undertake to avenge the loss of his 
officer. 

While I was impatiently waiting supplies 
from Croghan at Wills Creek, for now we 
were six days without flour, came news that 
Colonel Frye, my commander, was dead at 
that post. Colonel Innes of North Carolina, 
who was to succeed him in the whole com- 
mand, lay at Winchester with four hundred 
men; but as he continued to lie there, nei- 
ther he nor his troops were of any use in the 
campaign. 

During the period which elapsed between 
my fight on May 28 and my being attacked 
on July 3, being now a colonel, and sure of 
soon being reinforced, I made haste to com- 
plete the fort at Great Meadows. 

There I had excellent help from Captain 
Stobo and Mr. Adam Stephen, whom I 
made captain, and who, long after, be- 
came a general and served under me in the 
great war. 

It was only a log work we built, near to 
breast-high, with no roof, one hundred 
feet square, with partitions, and surrounded 
at some distance by a too shallow ditch and 
palisadoes. Captain Stobo gave to this de- 
fence the name of Fort Necessity, and said 



174 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

that the name was suggested by his empty 
belly, for indeed we were at this time half 
starved. 

Near about this time came three hundred 
men from Wills Greek, and, to my satisfac- 
tion, my friend Dr. Craik, who was of a 
merry disposition, and kept us in good hu- 
mour, besides what aid he gave us as a phy- 
sician, and I never had the service of a 
better. 

On the 9th of June arrived my old mili- 
tary teacher. Adjutant Muse, with other 
men, nine swivels, and a very small sup- 
ply of ammunifton. He fetched with him 
a wampum belt and presents and medals 
for the Indians, as I had desired of the 
governor. 

At this time, in order to secure the In- 
dians, who are fickle and must always be 
bribed, we had a fine ceremony, and I de- 
livered a speech sent from the governor. 

Dr. Craik gave me, two years ago, the ac- 
count he wrote home of this occasion, and 
I leave it in this place for the time, since 
it serves to record matters of which I have 
no distinct remembrance, and is better wrote 
than it would have been by me. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 175 

My dear Anne: To-day, before we move on, I 
send you a letter by a runner who returns to 
hasten our supplies. We had a great ceremony 
to-day. A space in the meadows near the fort 
was cleared, and all our men set around under 
arms in a great circle. In the middle stood the 
Colonel, very tall and, like all of us, very lean 
for lack of diet, for we are all shrunk like per- 
simmons in December. Before him were seated 
the Half-King and the son of Aliquippa, the 
Queen of one of the tribes. Last year our 
Colonel gave her a red match-coat and a bottle 
of rum, and now she is his great friend and 
waiting for more favours, especially rum. 

The warriors were painted to beat even a 
London lady, and no bird has more feathers or 
finer. The pipe of Council was passed around, 
and all took a few whiffs. When it came to 
the turn of our Colonel, he sneezed and 
coughed and made a wry face, but none of the 
Indians so much as smiled, for they are a very 
solemn folk. I could not refrain to laugh, so 
hid my face in the last handkerchief I possess. 
There are holes in it, too. Then we had the 
Indian's speech and that the Governor sent to 
be spoken. After this the Colonel hung around 
the necks of the Chiefs medals of silver sent 
from England. One had the British lion maul- 
ing the Gallic cock, and on the other side the 



176 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

King's effigy. Then the drums were beat, and 
the son of Aliquippa was taken into Council as 
a sachem, and given, as is the custom, a new 
name. I suppose it is a kind of heathen Chris- 
tening. He was called Fairfax. I hope his 
Lordship will look after his Godson, or devil 
son, as he is more like to be. The Half-King 
was made proud with the name of Dinwiddle, 
and so we are friends until to-morrow, and 
allies— I call them all lies. After this the 
Colonel read the morning service, which I hope 
pleased them. They believed he was making 
magic. 

This is a good account, and I certainly 
did make a face with the tobacco-smoke, 
for, although at that time I raised the weed, 
I cannot endure it. 

Captain Mackay arrived on the 7tli of 
June, but it came about untowardly that 
the company which thus joined me was 
not Virginian, and gave me more trouble 
than help. I may be wrong concerning 
the date of Captain Mackay 's arrival, but 
he was with us when, on the 10th of June, 
I moved out of our fort to prepare the 
road for the larger attempt proposed to 
take the defences at the Forks of the Ohio. 
I soon found that I was to have difficulty 



THE YOUTH OP WASHINGTON 111 

with this officer. I found him a good sort 
of a gentleman, but, as he had a distinct 
commission from the King, he declined to 
receive my commands, and, I found, would 
rather impede the service than forward it. 
I have made it a rule, however, to do the 
best I can in regard to obstacles I cannot 
control, and so I kept my temper and was 
always civil to this gentleman, even when 
he would not permit his men, unless paid a 
shilling a day, to assist in the making of 
roads. 

As two masters are worse in an army 
than anywhere else, he agreed willingly 
enough to remain at Fort Necessity, while 
I went on toward Redstone Creek with my 
Virginians to better my road. It was a 
hard task, and at night the men were so 
tired that the scouts and sentries could 
hardly keep awake. The Indians came in 
daily, asking presents, and were mostly 
spies. 

At Gist's old camp, thirteen miles from 
Great Meadows, I learned that Fort Du- 
quesne had been reinforced and that I was 
to be attacked by a large force. I sent back 
for Mackay, and at once called in all my 
hunters and scouting-parties. When Cap- 

12 



178 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

tain Mackay arrived we held a council and 
resolved that we had a better chance to de- 
fend ourselves at Fort Necessity. The of- 
ficers gave up their horses to carry the am- 
munition, and we began a retreat with all 
possible speed. The weather was of the 
worst, very hot and raining, and the Caro- 
lina men, who called themselves king's sol- 
diers, would give no assistance in dragging 
the swivels. What with hunger and toil, 
my rangers were worn out when, on July 1, 
we were come back to the fort. I was of 
half a mind to push on and secure my re- 
treat to Wills Creek; but the men refused 
to go on with the swivels, and the few 
horses we had were mere bone-bags, and 
some of them hardly fit to walk. 

I turned over the matter that night with 
Captains Mackay and Stephen, and re- 
solved, for, indeed, I could do no better, 
to send for help and abide in the fort. I 
was well aware that to retreat would turn 
every Indian on the frontier against us, and 
I was in good hope to hold out. 

If, as I wrote the governor, the French 
behaved with no greater spirit than they 
did in the Jumonville affair, I might yet 
come off well enough if provisions reached 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 179 

me in time, and I thought with proper re- 
inforcements we should have no great trou- 
ble in driving them to the devil and 
Montreal. 

On the evening of July 1 an Indian run- 
ner came in. He had been with De Villiers 
and a force from Duquesne. He told me 
that when that officer reached Gist's pali- 
sado he fired on it, but, finding no one there, 
was of a mind to go back, thinking I had 
returned to the settlements. Unfortunately, 
some of our Indians, who were now leaving 
us in numbers, told him I meant to make a 
stand at Fort Necessity. 

Whether I should fall back farther or 
not was now a matter for little choice. If 
I retreated with tired, half-starved men and 
no rum for refreshment, De Villiers 's large, 
well-fed force and quick-footed Indians 
would surely overtake us, and we should 
have to meetsuperiour numbers without be- 
ing intrenched. If Captain Mackay and his 
men, in my absence, had done anything to 
complete my fort, I should have fared bet- 
ter. Meanwhile we might be aided with men 
from Winchester, or, at least, be provi- 
sioned. I said nothing to the South Caro- 
lina officer of his neglect, for that would 



ISO THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

do no good, and I desired when it came to 
fighting he should be in a good humour. 

News seemed to fly through the forests as 
if the birds carried it, and I was not sur- 
prised to learn before I got to the fort that 
the Half-King and nearly all his warriors 
had stolen away. He was out of humour 
with the officers I had left in charge and 
said no one consulted him. I think he de- 
sired to escape a superiour force and to as- 
sure the safety of his squaws and papooses, 
whom I was not ill pleased to be rid of, but 
not of the warriors. 

After my men were fed. Captain Stobo, 
Adjutant Muse, Captain Stephen, and I 
took off our coats and went to work to help 
with axes, Dr. Craik very merry and cheer- 
ing the poor fellows, who were worn out 
with work. 

We raised the log shelter a log higher, 
and dug our ditch deeper, and, had we had 
more time, had done better to have enlarged 
the fort, for it was quite too small for the 
force. 



XXVII 

ON the evening of July 2, 1 went over the 
place with Captain Stobo. We were in 
the middle of a grassy meadow about two 
hundred and fifty yards wide, and no wood 
nearer than sixty yards. Stobo would have 
had us cut down the nearer trees, but the 
rangers could work no more. As to men, 
I had enough, if I had been supplied with 
ammunition and food. 

The next day being the 3d, this was tried 
—I mean the clearing away of trees; but 
about half-past ten I heard a shot in the 
woods on that side where the ground rises, 
and at once all the men hurried in, as was 
beforehand agreed, and a sentry ran limp- 
ing out of the woods, wounded. Next came 
our scouts in haste to say the French and 
Indians, a great force, were a mile away, 
eight hundred it was thought. At eleven 
I saw them in the forest on the nearest rise 
of ground, well under cover. I left Captain 

181 



182 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

Mackay in the fort, and set my rangers in 
the ditch, fairly covered by the earth cast 
up in the digging of it, hoping the enemy 
would make an assault. But they kept in the 
woods and tired incessantly. About 4 p.m. 
it came on to rain very heavy, with thunder 
and lightning. So great was the downfall 
that the water flowing into the ditch half 
filled it, and the pans and primings of the 
muskets got wetted, and our fire fell otf. 
Seeing this, I drew the men within the pali- 
sadoes and the log fort, where they were 
favourably disposed to resist an attack, for 
which the enemy seemed to have no stom- 
ach. This was near about 5 p.m., and soon, 
to my dismay, shots began to fall among us 
from the Indians, who climbed the trees and 
thus had us at an advantage. 

Many men began to drop, and De Pey- 
ronney, a Huguenot captain, was badly 
wounded, while our own shooting, because 
of the torrent of rain, was much slackened, 
and at dusk our ammunition nearly all used. 
Twelve men were killed and forty-three 
wounded out of the three hundred rangers, 
but how many out of the Independent com- 
pany I do not know, nor was the loss of the 
enemy ever ascertained. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 183 

About 7 P.M., seeing that we had almost 
ceased to fire, the French called a parley, 
which I declined ; but at eight, knowing our 
state and that we had scarce any provisions 
left, I answered their second flag that I 
would send an officer, and for this errand 
would have ordered De Peyronney, who 
spoke the French tongue, but that he was 
hurt and in great pain. I had no one but 
Van Braam who knew any French. He 
went, and returned with demands for a 
capitulation so dishonourable that I could 
not consider them. At last, however, we 
came to terms, which were to march out 
with all the honours of war, Van Braam and 
Captain Stobo volunteering to go as hos- 
tages for the return of Drouillon and La 
Force. 

It was eleven o'clock at night and very 
dark when Van Braam translated the final 
terms of capitulation. We were to march 
away unmolested and to agree not to build 
forts or occupy the lands of his Most Chris- 
tian Majesty for a year; but to this vague 
stipulation I did not object. It was raining 
furiously, and we heard the terms read by 
the light of one candle, which was put out 
by the rain, over and over, as Van Braam, 



184 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

with no great ease, let me hear what, he 
declared, was set down. Unhappily, he 
translated the words which twice made me 
agree to be taken as the assassin of De Vil- 
liers's brother, Jumonville, so as to read 
that the French had come to revenge the 
death of that gentleman, and understanding 
it, with Stephen and Mackay, to mean this 
and no more, I signed the paper and thus 
innocently subjected myself to a foul cal- 
umny. 

At dawn we moved out with one swivel 
and drums beating and colours flying. This 
was on July 4. I was reminded of it when, 
on July 9, 1776, I paraded the army to an- 
nounce that on July 4 the Congress had 
declared that we were no longer colonies 
but free and independent States. Then I 
remembered the humiliation of the morn- 
ing when we filed away before those who 
were to become our friends and allies. 

I bade good-by to Van Braam and Stobo, 
and we began our homeward march, all on 
foot, because of our horses having been 
taken when we were forced to leave them 
outside of the fort. We had gone scarce a 
mile, carrying our wounded on rude litters, 
when, against all the terms agreed upon. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 18 5 

the Indians followed and robbed the rear 
baggage, misusing many. Upon this, show- 
ing a bold front, I drove them off, and 
destroying all useless baggage, set out 
again. 

Some died on our way, others fell out 
and were no more heard of ; and thus, half 
starved and weary, we made the seventy 
miles to Wills Creek. 

Having conducted my command to this 
point, where was all they required in the 
way of clothing and supplies, I rode with 
Captain Mackay to Williamsburg. 

I felt for a time and with much sharpness 
the sense of defeat, and I heard later that 
Captain Mackay complained that I was dull 
company on the ride, which was no doubt 
true enough, for I felt that he and his com- 
mand were partly to be blamed. 

Indeed, I appeared to myself at this time 
the most unfortunate of men; but I have 
often been led to observe that we forget our 
calamities more easily than the pleasures 
of life, nor on the occasion here described 
could I so much reproach myself as those 
who had failed to supply me with the am- 
munition and provisions required for suc- 
cess. 



186 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

Although it was near to nine at night 
when we rode into Williamsburg and put 
up at the Raleigh Tavern, I went at once 
to the house called the governor's palace, 
but much inferiour in size and convenience 
to the fine houses of Westover and Bran- 
don. The governor being gone to supper 
elsewhere, I gave the sealed package con- 
taining the capitulation, all in French, with 
the signatures of De Villiers and myself, 
to the governor's aide. 

In the morning I called upon the gov- 
ernor and was cordially received. He said 
that we could not go into the details of 
the caj^itulation until the articles of it were 
fairly Englished. This would require a 
day. He made rather too light, I thought, 
of the surrender and of what seemed to 
me serious; for to my mind the French 
were come to stay. 

While the governor was assuring me that 
we should easily drive out the invaders, 
my kinsman, Colonel Willis of the council, 
joined us. He considered the situation on 
the frontier as very grave, and succeeded 
in alarming the governor, a man of confi- 
dent and very sanguine disposition. At 
last Colonel Willis turned to me and said: 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 187 

' ' George, I dare venture to engage that this 
little fire you have left blazing will set the 
world aflame." 

After further talk I left them. I had 
been before this in the capital of the colony, 
but always for a brief visit. Now, having 
time, I walked down the broad Duke of 
Gloucester street, and saw the famous Wil- 
liam and Mary College, and in front of it 
the statue of Lord Botetour. There were 
many fine houses and the handsome parish 
church of Bruton, said to have been planned 
by the great Sir Christopher Wren. 



XXVIII 

THE next morning about nine came Mr. 
William Fairfax to the inn and said: 
' * There is some trouble about the capitula- 
tions, but I do not know what. You are 
wanted at once by the council." 

Upon this I made haste to reach the pal- 
ace, wondering what could be the matter. 

In the council-chamber were several gen- 
tlemen standing, in silence— Mr. Speaker 
Robinson, Colonel Gary, and my Lord Fair- 
fax, as I was pleased to see, he having ar- 
rived that morning to be a guest of Gov- 
ernor Dinwiddle. There were also others, 
all standing in groups, but who they were 
I fail now to remember. All of them ap- 
peared to be serious as I went in, and there 
was, of a sudden, silence, except that the 
governor, a bulky man, very red in the face 
and of choleric temper, was walking about 
cursing in a most unseemlj^ way. Lord 
Fairfax alone received me pleasantly, com- 

188 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 189 

ing forward to greet me, but no one else did 
more than bow. The governor came toward 
me, and holding the capitulations in one 
hand, struck them with the other hand and 
cried out: "Explain, sir— explain how you, 
sir, an officer of the King, came to admit over 
your signature that you were an assassin, 
and twice, sir, twice. I consider you dis- 
graced. ' ' 

Lord Fairfax laid a hand on my arm to 
stay me and said : 

"Your Excellency, it is not the manner 
among us to condemn a man unheard ; nor, 
sir, to address a gentleman as you have per- 
mitted yourself to do." 

Colonel Gary said : ' ' That, sir, is also my 
own opinion." For this I was grateful, 
because on a former occasion he had himself 
been lacking in civility. 

Then my cousin Willis came across the 
room and said very low: "Keep yourself 
quiet, George." 

I bowed and asked to be shown the trans- 
lation. I read it over with care, while no 
one spoke. What had been said was cor- 
rect. For a moment I was too amazed to 
speak. As I looked up, utterly confounded, 
Lord Fairfax said: "Well, colonel?" 



190 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

Upon this I related the facts of the case, 
and that Captains Mackay and Stephen had 
heard Van Braam translate the articles, and 
that he had never used the word assassina- 
tion, but, in place of it, death; and that I 
considered it to have been ignorance on his 
part, and no worse. 

I saw also that, while I had been given 
to understand by Van Braam that for a 
year we were pledged not to make any forts 
on the lands of the King of France, I had 
really agreed that we were not for that 
period to do so beyond the mountains. 

When I had thus fully accounted for 
my misapprehension. Lord Fairfax said 
at once: "Then, gentlemen, this unfor- 
tunate mistake and this unlucky pledge 
were due to the governor's council having 
failed to provide Colonel Washington with 
a competent French interpreter." I could 
hardly help smiling at this transfer of the 
blame to the governor and his advisers. 
Colonel Byrd laughed outright, as the gov- 
ernor, with a great oath, cried out, "Non- 
sense, my lord," and to me, "You should 
be broke, sir; you are unfit to command." 

Lord Fairfax said quietly, "Be careful 
of your words, governor. ' ' This stayed his 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 191 

speech, but amid entire silence he stood 
shaking with anger, so that, although his 
wig was covered with a net, the powder fell 
over his scarlet coat. 

Upon this I threw the capitulations on 
the table and, with much effort controlling 
myself, said: "I have explained myself to 
the honourable council and have no more 
to say." 

The governor said: ''I presume, sir, we 
must accept your statement." I replied at 
once, looking about me : ' * If any gentleman 
here doubts it, I—" But on this Colonel 
Gary said: "I do not. I think the matter 
cleared. Colonel Washington, and I trust 
that his Excellency will see that he has 
spoken in haste." 

Lord Fairfax and Mr. Robinson also 
spoke to like effect, and with a degree of 
warmth which set me entirely at ease. The 
governor, much vexed to be thus taken to 
task, said in a surly way that he was satis- 
fied and that Van Braam was a traitor, 
which I declined to believe, also adding that 
Captain Stephen would be asked to see the 
governor and confirm my statement. 

After this, to my surprise, the governor 
desired my company at dinner, and seeing 



192 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

Lord Fairfax nod to me, I accepted, but 
with no very good will. The matter ended 
with a vote of thanks from the House of 
Burgesses, Van Braam being left out, and 
also Adjutant Muse, who was considered 
to have shown cowardice. I was well done 
with a sorry business. 

Indeed, but for the rain, the bad light, 
and that I had no reason to disbelieve what 
Van Braam read to us, I should have looked 
over the paper, where the word assassin, 
being as much English as French, must 
have caught my eye. AVliat seemed to me 
most strange was that De Villiers should 
so easily have let go a man whom he pro- 
fessed to consider the murderer of his 
brother. 

When we surrendered the French officers 
were very civil, and I saw no evidence of 
unusual enmity, but I do not think I met 
M. de Villiers. 

Van Braam was very much abused and 
called a traitor, which I neither then nor 
later believed him to have been. Some few 
in Virginia blamed me, but since then I 
have lived through many worse calumnies. 

As each nation was casting the blame of 
warlike action on the other, much was made 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 193 

in France of the death of De Jumonville 
and the surrender of Fort Necessity. 

I was able long afterwards to see the ac- 
count of this capitulation at Fort Neces- 
sity as it was given by the French com- 
mander, M. de Villiers. It was quite false, 
but he could not have known all the facts 
as to De Jumonville 's conduct nor how the 
Dutchman Van Braam— as I believe, with- 
out intention— misled me. That he was not 
bribed to do so is shown by the fact that, 
being held as a hostage, he was long kept in 
jail in Quebec. 

It is to be remarked as worthy of note 
that only a month ago I should have heard 
news of this old soldier of fortune. A let- 
ter came to me at Mount Vernon in which 
Van Braam related his wanderings and how 
at last he had settled down in France, as it 
would seem, in a prosperous way. He was 
very flattering to his old pupil, and, for my 
part, I wish him good luck and a better 
knowledge of the French tongue than he 
had when we starved together at the Great 
Meadows. 

I am also reminded as I write that Lieu- 
tenant-Colonel Wynne asked leave during 
the siege of Yorktown to present to me a 



194 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

young French nobleman, an officer of the 
regiment Auvergne, whose name now es- 
capes me. This gentleman's father had 
served in Canada under Marquis Montcalm, 
and before that on the frontier. The con- 
versation fell upon my early service on the 
Ohio. To my great astonishment, the 
young gentleman told me that in 1759 a 
French writer, called, if I remember, 
Thomas, published a long piece in verse 
about this unfortunate De Jumonville in 
America, and how his murder was avenged. 
I never supposed any one would write 
poetry concerning me, nor do I believe it 
will ever happen again. 



XXIX 

I FIND my diaries insufficient as to the 
events which preceded the battle on the 
Monongahela, where, in Braddock's rout, 
I lost almost all my papers, with my plans 
and maps, chiefly copies of those I had 
given the general. This I now regret more 
than I did at the time when my memory 
served me better. Finding, as I have 
noted before, that to write of events recalls 
particulars, I shall endeavour thus to re- 
vive my personal remembrances, but not 
to record at length the entire history of the 
defeat of General Braddock. 

I do not suppose that any land was ever 
worse governed than Virginia was under 
Dinwiddle, and as to military affairs worst 
of all, but not worse than other colonies. 
The governors were ignorant of warfare 
and expected too much from the half- 
trained militia and their careless officers. 
These conditions may have seemed to jus- 

195 



196 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

tify the King's order that all officers holding 
militia ajDpointments should be outranked 
by all royal commissions, and even by the 
King's officers on half-pay. This was bad 
enough, but there were also Independent 
companies raised in time of need ; and their 
officers, being directly commissioned by the 
governors acting for the King, insisted on 
their right to outrank gentlemen of the mili- 
tia, and led the men in their commands to 
disobey such officers and to consider them- 
selves of a class superiour to the militia. I 
had alreadj^ had so sad an experience of the 
difficulties which arose out of these condi- 
tions that I was unwilling to submit to Gov- 
ernor Dinwiddle's plan of making all the 
militia Independent companies and with 
only captains in command. The object to 
be attained by this awkward expedient was 
to put a stop to the constant disputes as to 
precedency and command. As this would 
reduce me from colonel to captain, I made 
it clear to the governor that it was not, in 
my opinion, a step to be advised, but I 
would consider of it, which, indeed, took me 
no long time. 

In November I resigned my commission, 
and before it was accepted went to Alexan- 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 197 

dria, where my regiment then lay. I asked 
the officers to meet me and explained the 
cause of my being forced to resign, I was 
surprised to find that my resolution, which 
all admitted to be reasonable, met with the 
most flattering opposition. Indeed, I re- 
ceived soon after a letter from these gentle- 
men in which, with much more, they said: 

We, your obedient and affectionate officers, 
beg leave to express our great concern at the 
marked disagreeable news we have received of 
your determination to resign the command of 
the corps. Your steady adherence to impartial 
justice, your quick discernment and invariable 
regard to merit, enlivened our natural emula- 
tion to excel. 

As this letter lies before me and I think 
of the emotion it caused me, I still like to 
remember that at the close they spoke of 
me as ''one who taught them to despise 
danger and to think lightly of toil and hard- 
ships while led by a man they knew and 
loved. ' ' 

I have been spoken of as wanting in sensi- 
bility. If it had been said I lacked means 
to show what I feel, that were to put the 



198 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

matter more correctly. Even now tlie recol- 
lection of the praise thus given moves me 
deeply, and recalls the memory of my fare- 
well to those who served with me in the 
War of Independency. I was but twenty- 
three when I left the colonial service. 

I did so with much reluctance, for my 
desire was not to leave the military line, as 
my inclinations were still strongly bent to 
arms, and of this I assured Colonel Fitz- 
hugh very plainly when he would have had 
me submit to return to service in the in- 
feriour grade of captain. I preferred my 
farm to submitting to this degradation. 

Among the minor matters which, by de- 
grees, discontented even the most loyal of 
the upper class of Virginia gentlemen, 
none was more ill borne than the imperti- 
nence and insults to which this order of the 
King gave rise. 

Having thus, with much regret, resigned 
my commission, T retired to private life at 
Mount Vernon and to the care of my neg- 
lected plantations. 

As we had left two hostages, Van Braam 
and Stobo, in the hands of the French after 
my defeat at the Meadows, I was anxious 
that La Force and the French officers we 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 199 

held should be treated with decency and ex- 
changed for my two captains. 

In spite of my earnest remonstrances, 
Drouillon and two cadets were alone of- 
fered for exchange, and La Force held in 
prison, which, of course, the French re- 
fused to consider. My wishes were disre- 
garded in this matter in which I considered 
my honour was involved, and I was treated 
with the indifference the governor so often 
showed to the advice of colonial gentlemen 
of consideration. I was deeply mortified, 
and La Force was at least two years in 
jail, nor do I know what became of him. 
In retaliation, Van Braam and Stobo were 
long detained in prison by the French at 
Quebec, but finally got away, I do not know 
how. Captain Stobo, a Scotchman, I be- 
lieve, was a sober, brave, and sensible man. 
That he was ingenious and little subject to 
fear appears from the fact that, while im- 
prisoned at Fort Duquesne, he contrived a 
plan of the fort, and also to send it to the 
governor by an Indian. Had he been de- 
tected it must have cost his life. 

After the fall of Quebec in 1759, 1 was in- 
formed by an officer that Captain Stobo 
made his escape before that event, and had 



200 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

been able to join his Majesty's troops, and 
finally had guided General Wolfe on the 
path by which he succeeded to occupy the 
Plains of Abraham. I do not know what 
truth there was in the story. 

While time ran on and I was busy with 
the innocent pursuits of agriculture, Eng- 
land and France were preparing for serious 
warfare, and as I heard of the efforts to be 
made to recover the Ohio and the forts at 
the North, I became troubled that I was 
to have no share in the business. Sir John 
St. Clair had come out in this year (1755) 
as deputy quartermaster-general, and was 
at once much disgusted at colonial ineffi- 
ciency, and expressed himself with such 
freedom as gave great offence. Five weeks 
later, in February, I believe. General Brad- 
dock reached Williamsburg, where I then 
chanced to be on business concerning the 
purchase of bills on London. On this occa- 
sion I once more appealed to the authori- 
ties concerning Stobo and Van Braam; but 
although I spent some time in efforts to 
persuade Governor Dinwiddle that to fur- 
ther hold La Force was to prevent the 
release of two brave and innocent men, 
he persistently refused. Upon this I went 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 201 

away, declining to discuss other matters on 
which he would have had my opinion. 

While at Williamsburg, Colonel Peyton 
invited me to visit Sir John St. Clair, to 
whom I was able to express my regret that 
the conditions of the King's late order as 
to rank must deprive me and other colonial 
gentlemen of the pleasure of serving. Sir 
John said that he was surprised to en- 
counter so much sensitiveness among us. 
To this I made no reply, but Colonel Byrd, 
who was present, said if Sir John would in 
his mind reverse our positions he would find 
the matter to explain itself. Sir John said 
that he could not imagine himself a pro- 
vincial captain of border farm-hands. 

Upon this Colonel Byrd rose and said 
there was also something which he could 
not imagine Sir John to be. Seeing a quar- 
rel close at hand, a thing very undesirable 
when already we were on edge owing to 
the affectation of superiority on the part 
of some of Sir John's aides, I was fortu- 
nate enough to say that Colonel Byrd no 
doubt misunderstood Sir John, and that I 
never had been able to put myself in an- 
other man's place. Sir John, who had 
spoken hastily, was also of no mind to pro- 



202 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

voke a gentleman of Colonel Byrd's influ- 
ence, and said at once that he had no 
intention to offend, and thus the matter 
ended. 

It was, however, this kind of thing which 
made so much bad blood in the colonies 
and was so deeply resented by men of all 
classes. 

In the afternoon I met Colonel Byrd, 
who said I had spoiled a good quarrel and 
that he considered it would be necessary 
to teach some of the officers a lesson in 
manners. I said I hoped that at this crisis 
it might be avoided. I had quite forgot 
this incident, and am agreeably surprised, 
now that my memory is failing, at recov- 
ering by attention so many things which 
seemed lost. 

On the following morning Sir John called 
upon me and asked would I dine with him 
that day, to meet General Braddock, whom, 
on his arrival, I had welcomed in a letter 
expressing my regret at being out of the 
service. 

I was glad to meet the new commander, 
and at Sir John's request named several 
gentlemen who should have the same hon- 
our, and who might be of great use in the 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 203 

campaign. On this occasion there was less 
heavy drinking than usual, and I was very 
agreeably entertained and much questioned 
as to the border. I promised to send 
my maps to the general, who, upon my 
taking leave, hoped some way might be 
found to secure my services in the com- 
ing campaign. 

Indeed, I was more eager than the gen- 
eral, and, as occasion served, I was still 
more open with some of the younger mem- 
bers of General Braddock's family concern- 
ing my continued desire to follow the mili- 
tary line. 

I rode homeward a day or two later, 
taking Fredericksburg on the way, that I 
might see my mother. I found her in the 
garden of her house, engaged in putting 
some plants in the ground. 

She said she was pleased to see me, but 
did hardly look up from her work and went 
on talking of the family. I was of no mind 
to stop her, and, indeed, it was always best 
to let her have her say; nor did I now in- 
terrupt her, which out of respect I never 
inclined to do. 

My sister Betty Lewis, having more de- 
sire to talk than I ever had, could never 



204 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

hear my mother out, and this I did not ap- 
prove, nor did it do any good. 

While I was listening came a servant 
with a letter inclosed in a cover with a 
flying seal of Captain Orme's arms. The 
letter within carried the royal arms and 
'' On his Majesty's service with speed," 
wrote large. It appeared that when I had 
gone, the general's aide. Captain Orme, re- 
quested Colonel Peyton to forward to me 
this communication, and accordingly he had 
sent it after me as desired. I excused my- 
self and read it with pleasure. 

My mother, being curious as to small 
things, and as to large ones too often in- 
different, asked me what it was, and was 
eager to know why it bore the King 's arms. 
I saw no better way than to let her read it. 

She gave it back to me, saying, '' I sup- 
pose my opinions about this business of 
war are never to be regarded, ' ' and more be- 
sides than I desire to recall. I replied that 
there was only one answer a man of hon- 
our and a loyal subject of the King could 
make, and that I should at once accept if 
time were given me to set in order my af- 
fairs; and so, with this, after much advice 
on her part that my duty lay at home and 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 205 

on my plantation, I got away, avoiding to 
say more, my mind being fully made up. 
I find the letter now among my papers, and 
reading it in my old age, renew the memory 
of the satisfaction it gave me when young. 

Williamsburg, March 2, 1755. 
Sir: The General, having been informed by 
friends that you expressed some desire to make 
the campaign, but that you declined it upon 
some disagreeableness that you thought might 
arise from the regulations of command, has or- 
dered me to acquaint you that he will be very 
glad of your company in his family, by which 
all inconveniences of that kind will be obvi- 
ated. 

I shall think myself very happy to form an 
acquaintance with a person so universally 
esteemed, and shall use every opportunity of 
assuring you how much I am 

Your obedient servant, 

Kohert Ornie, 
Aide-de-camp. 

I have no doubt that Colonel Peyton was 
the gentleman who, knowing my wishes, 
had suggested my appointment. I was con- 
sidered by some to have been imprudent at 
Fort Necessity, and the governor, because 



206 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

of the freedom of speech I used with him 
in the matter of Stobo and La Force, had 
for me no great regard, and was very un- 
likely to have favoured me with the general. 

Before leaving Williamsburg, Mr. C , 

a cousin of Colonel Peyton, visited me and 
said he had been well advised to seek my 
friendship in a letter from the colonel, 
which he thought might please me and 
which I was free to read. As to my ap- 
pearance, wit, and judgment, the letter 
spoke in the most agreeable language, and 
added that I was destined to make no 
inconsiderable figure in our country. I 
confess to having felt, as I read it, both 
pleasure and doubt. 



XXX 

I HAD thus engaged as a volunteer, much 
against the wishes of my mother, who, 
as she said, saw no good in war and en- 
treated me not again to expose myself to 
peril in the wilderness. If the French had 
been of her opinion as to war, I might have 
stayed at home. We had an unpleasant 
meeting, or rather parting, for she did little 
else but lament ; but what was there I could 
do ? I left her in tears. 

I have no intention to record here the 
full history of this expedition, but rather to 
revive for my own interest what I, person- 
ally, saw, and what is nowhere else fully 
set down. 

My appointment gave satisfaction to 
many friends, who felt more deeply than I 
myself that in the matter of commissions 
and as to the Villiers affair— for that was 
soon noised about— I had been ill treated 
by the governor. The favourable senti- 

207 



208 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

ments thus expressed could not, under the 
circumstances, be other than pleasing to a 
mind which had always walked a straight 
line and endeavoured, as far as human 
frankness and strong passions would allow, 
to discharge the relative duties to his Maker 
and to his fellow-countrymen without by 
indirect means seeking popularity. 

As I pause here before making the effort 
to recall some of the incidents of the dis- 
astrous events in which I was to have a 
share, I remember with pleasure the friends 
who felt that my honourable invitation from 
a veteran general was a final answer to the 
censures of the King's governor. 

Nor, in looking back over the greater 
war and my life in office, have I had reason 
to complain of want of affection from those 
whose esteem I desired to retain. Many 
times in my life I have, however, had just 
cause to complain of things said of me by 
those who possessed my regard, but I have 
in all such cases felt it better not to sacri- 
fice a friendship on account of ill temper 
or the indiscretion of the hour, and am 
made happy in the belief that I have thus 
been able to keep what I would not willingly 
have lost. Where men have been needed in 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 209 

the service or in office, I have been still more 
desirous of forgiving words or actions 
which affected me alone, but which did not 
in the end destroy their usefulness. Nor 
have I myself been without need to be thus 
considered, for at times I am by nature ir- 
ritable and short of temper. Lawrence 
once said to me that he found it more easy 
to forgive his enemies than his friends ; but 
this I did not clearly see, and, after all, if a 
man is resolved to keep himself from think- 
ing of what is said against him, the mem- 
ory of it soon becomes dulled and there is 
less need of forgiveness. 

Among the many evidences of esteem I 
had before the Braddock affair was a letter 
from Captain Peyronney, now recovered 
of his wound, but to die bravely on the 
Monongahela. He must have heard that 
I had been ill spoken of by Major Muse and 
perhaps by others. He wrote very odd 
English, but I could hardly find fault with 
his meaning. 

Sir: I Shan't make Bold to Describe the pro- 
ceedings of the House [of Burgesses], which no 
doute you have had already Some hint of. I 
only will make use of these three expressions: 

14 



210 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

furtim venerunt; invane Sedenmt; and pertur- 
iate Redierunt. 

But all that is matere of indifference to the 
wirginia Regiment Collo. Washington will still 
Remain att the head of it, and I spect with more 
esplendor than ever; for (as I hope) notwith- 
standing we will Be on the British stabichment, 
we shall be augmented to Six houndred and by 
those means entitle you to the Name not only of 
protector of your Contry But to that of the 
flower of the wirginians, By the powers you '11 
have in your hands to prove it So. 

Many enquired to me about Muses Braveries ; 
poor Body I h 'd pity him ha 'nt he had the weak- 
ness to Confes his coardies him self, and the im- 
pudence to taxe all the reste of the oficiers with- 
oud exception of the same imperfection, for he 
said to many of the Consulars and Burgeses that 
he was Bad But th' the reste was as Bad as he : — 

To speak francly had I been in town at that 
time I eou'nt help'd to make use of my horse's 
wheap for to vindicate the injury of that villain. 

he Contrived his Business so that several ask 
me if it was true that he had challeng'd you to 
fight : my answer was no other But that he should 
rather chuse to go to hell thand doing of it, for 
had he had such thing declar'd: that was his 
Sure Road— 

I have made my particular Business to tray if 
any had some Bad intention against you here 



THE YOUTH OP WASHINGTON 211 

Below: But thank God I meet allowais with a 
goad wish for you from evry mouth each one 
entertining such Caracter of you as I have the 
honnour to do my Self who am the Most humble 
And Obediant of your Servants 

Le Chevalier de Peyronney. 

I had much cause to feel grateful for 
such friends, and I may here add that, as 
concerns Van Braam, I had his censure re- 
versed when I myself became a member of 
the House of Burgesses. 

As soon as possible after bringing my 
affairs into order, I set out, determined to 
lose no chance to perfect my military educa- 
tion. 

At Fredericktown I met the general, and 
on May 10 was announced in general orders 
as aide, with brevet rank of captain. I 
rode thence in advance to Winchester, 
where I had need to send a servant to bor- 
row fresh horses from my friend Lord Fair- 
fax, who himself came later from Greenway 
Court to meet me and rode with me about 
one hundred miles to Wills Creek, near to 
which was Fort Cumberland, so named for 
the captain-general. 

On the last day of our ride, as we rode on 



212 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

over, I do believe, the most abominable 
roads in the world, I described to his lord- 
ship the array of well-drilled men, sailors, 
artillery, etc., I had seen at Alexandria, 
landed from Admiral Keppel's fleet, and 
said, if I remember, that it was a great ad- 
vantage to serve under a gentleman of Gen- 
eral Braddock's abilities and experience, 
and that as to any danger from the enemy, I 
considered it as trifling, for I believed the 
French would be obliged to exert their ut- 
most strength to repel the attacks about to 
be made on their forts at Niagara and 
Crown Point. 



XXXI 

AS I talked, Lord Fairfax, who had seen 
jl\_ greater armies, heard me in silence, 
and indeed, when I ceased, remained for a 
time without making any comment. Then 
he reined up his horse, and, handing me 
two letters, said: ''I have kept these for 
your private reading, George ; I have them 
through the kindness of one of Admiral 
Keppel 's officers. ' ' I read them as we rode 
on, well in the rear, to avoid the annoyance 
caused by the marching of the Forty-eighth 
Foot, which beat up a great dust. He said : 
''Read them again at your leisure." I did 
as was desired, and, as they happened to be 
left in my buckskin-coat pocket and forgot, 
they were the only papers I chanced to save 
in the battle. They are now before me, and 
I read them anew with interest. Not for 
many years have I seen them. 

My dear Lord: I take this occasion to write 
you. London is very gay, and the clubs and 
213 



214 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

their wits amazing merry over the appointment 
of Charles Braddock to command the force sent 

out to protect you from the Indians. Ch. S y 

was here for dinner yesterday. He said General 
B. was a stranger both to fear and common sense, 
and that his best fitness to fight Indians was that 
he was providentially bald. Lord C. S. says he 
saw Anne Bellamy, the actress, whom the Gen- 
eral visited when on the point of leaving London. 
She said Mr. Braddock was melancholy, and de- 
clared he was sent with a handful of men to 
conquer nations and to cut his way through an 
unknown wilderness. 

He said: "We are sent like sacrifices to the 
altar," That ancient ram! say I. He told her 
she would never see him again. 

I wish you luck of your new General. He is 
touchy, punctilious, of a stiff mind, and has had 
forty years in the Guards. I do not think he was 
eager to leave Anne Bellamy and the clubs, for 
the man is a favourite ; but he has little money, 
and it will be at least agreeable to spend the 
king's guineas. 

If you were a woman I should tell you the new 
fashions. The beaux now carry their watches 
in their muffs, and the women are talking, more 

and more, to what Charles S y calls undress 

uniform, so that soon Madame Eve will be the 
fashionable maker of gowns! — but I must not 
nourish your provincial blushes. Lord R. tells 
me that your General is a sad brute, for when 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 215 

his sister— a pretty thing she was— spent all her 
money at cards and hanged herself, the man 
said: ''Poor Fanny, I always thought she would 
play till she would be forced to tuck herself up." 
Horace Walpole says, when she meant to die, 
she wrote with a diamond on the window-pane 
this out of Garth's "Dispensary": 

'' To die is landing on some silent shore, 
Where billows never break nor tempests roar." 

But why should the woman die when she had 
a diamond left to gamble with? 

However, the Duke of Cumberland is his pa- 
tron, and that is enough. F x lost the other 

night at White 's, they say, £1000 and— 

I looked up and said : ' ' The rest does not 
seem to be of interest or to say more of the 
general. ' ' 

' ' No, but always look at the postscript of 
a lady's letter. There is more about your 
general. ' ' 

It was true, for I read : 

P.S. I meant not to tell you of Braddock's 
affair with Colonel Gumley, who was his friend, 
but I may as well, even if you think it incred- 
ible. A letter is a fine way to talk, because you 
can never see the blush you may cause, and may 
fib without being vexed by contradiction until 
so long after that you have forgotten all about 



216 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

it. But what a pother I am making about my 
harmless gossip ! 

When Braddock quarrelled over cards with 
his friend, and swords were drawn, Gumley 
(you know, Lord Pulteney married his sister) 
cried out: "Braddock, you are a penniless dog. 
If you kill me you have no money, and you will 
have to run away." So with that he tossed him 
his purse. Braddock was in such a rage that 
Gumley easily disarmed him, but he would not 
ask his life. 

As we rode on I said it seemed to me to 
show that our general was foolishly obsti- 
nate, and that I liked the other man better, 
but neither very much. 

His lordship said : ' ' Yes, yes ; it is a wild 
and a sillj^ life. The woman is heartless, 
but what she says may serve to put you on 
your guard. These people think London 
the only part of the w^orld worth a thought. 
The other letter is of more moment. It is 
from Colonel Conway. I have inked over 
these names ; they do not matter. He is of 
another clay." 

London. 

My dear Lord: My nephew, Mr. Henry 
Wilton, carries this letter to you, and any kind 
attention you may feel disposed to pay him will 
oblige me. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 217 

I think the choice of Braddock unfortunate. 
He is a brave, or rather a reckless, man, over- 
confident, arrogant, and sure to despise his en- 
emy, and goes out, as I am assured, with a bad 
opinion of the Colonials. Horace Walpole, who 
knows, as we all do, the mad life Braddock has 
led in London, says: "He is a very Iroquois in 
disposition, and so, I suppose, fit to fight his 
kind." Horace is making himself merry over 
the appointment, and the Colonial helping he is 
to have. But it is the fashion here to laugh at 
Colonials, and not for the world would Horace 
be out of the fashion. I wish the General may 
have good fortune, but I fear the matching of 
drill and pipe-clay against the wiles of the 
woods; as sensible would it be to set a fencing- 
master with a rapier to fight a tiger in a jungle. 
When I consider how vast is this increasing num- 
ber of English in a country where must be great 
prospects and a fine sense of independency, I 
wonder how little they are regarded here. But 
it is our way to despise other nations, and even 
our own blood if it has had enterprise to cross 
the seas. Come back and help us to learn better. 
Always your Lordship's 

Ob 'dt humle servt. 

Henry Conway. 

His lordship looked at me as I put away 
the letters. I said : ' ' That seems to me good 



218 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

sense ; but about the general, I cannot credit 
it." 

''You will judge for yourself," he said, 
"if this be the man to send into the wilder- 
ness. Keep the letters, but do not lose 
them ; you may return them later. ' ' Which 
I should have done, only that the rout on 
the Monongahela put it out of my mind. 



XXXII 

IT was about noon when, as I have said, 
being in the rear of the Forty-eighth 
Foot, we heard a noise behind us. We drew 
up at the side within the wood to see what 
was coming. 

Amid a great dust came General Brad- 
dock, in a fine red chariot bought of Gov- 
ernor Sharpe, with an escort of light horse, 
all in great haste, and bumping over the 
worst road possible. Presently they flew 
by the troops, who saluted, the drums beat- 
ing the Grenadier's March, a tune I was to 
hear again. 

" If I were the general, ' ' I said, ' ' I should 
have preferred a horse to a coach. ' ' 

' ' Not if you were he, ' ' said his lordship. 

''But the man is not a fool," I ventured 
to say. ' ' He seemed to me not to want for 
intelligence. ' ' 

"An intelligent fool, George, is the worst 
fool. His intelligence feeds his folly." 

219 



220 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

This, like much else that his lordship said 
to me, was not so plain as it would be now, 
and, accordingly, I made no reply. 

After being silent for a time, his lordship 
went on to say that I should do well to talk 
little, and quietly to observe things for my- 
self ; that he himself knew General Brad- 
dock to be a spendthrift, obstinate as a pig, 
and very self-confident; and, finally, that I 
knew what a lot of drilled regulars would 
be worth in the woods. He feared also that 
the officers were quite unfit for the service. 

As it was the way of his lordship to mock 
at most things, it did not affect me as much 
as what I saw and heard later, for, unfor- 
tunately, he was not alone in his opinion 
concerning the general. 

By and b}^ the general having preceded 
us by an hour, we heard the salute of sev- 
enteen guns, fired as he entered the camp. 

We came in sight of the tents about Wills 
Creek early in the afternoon, and were 
walking our horses, very tired, man and 
beast, when a gentleman came towards us. 
He was mounted on a rather uneasy animal, 
and I saw, as he met us and we bowed, that 
his girth was loose and he in danger of a 
fall. I dismounted and, with an apology, 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 221 

set it right. He thanked me and got oi¥ 
his horse, saying, as was plain to see, that 
he was no horseman and would walk, pre- 
ferring two certain legs to four uncertain 
ones. On this his lordship also dismounted, 
and, our servants taking the horses, we 
walked on together. But first his lordship 
said: "I am Lord Fairfax, and this is 
my friend, Colonel George Washington. 
May we have the honour to know your 
name ? ' ' 

He replied, *'I am Benjamin Franklin," 
and asked if this were Colonel Washington 
who had been in command in the Jumon- 
ville affair. I said I had had that good 
fortune, and after this he turned to his lord- 
ship, and, they conversing, I was able to ob- 
serve the looks and ways of Mr. Franklin, 
who was now the Postmaster-General and 
known throughout the colonies as a learned 
man, and in affairs very competent. I was 
to be deeply engaged with him in the future. 

He was at this time a vigorous man of 
forty-nine years, with a great head and a 
kindly look, clad very simply in a gray suit. 
When he began to talk I envied him the 
ease and exactness with which he expressed 
himself, and the prudence he showed in 



222 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

speech, of which quality his lordship had 
little. 

When at last the Postmaster-General 
learned that I was to serve as a volunteer 
aide, he smiled and remarked that that was 
to manufacture glory for others and not 
even to get pay. To this I replied that I con- 
sidered my ends were clear enough to me, 
for that I was, as it were, an apprentice, 
and was bent to acquire experience in war 
under one who knew the business. He said 
he hoped I should not be disappointed, and 
at this I saw his lordship smile ; and so no 
more of moment passed between us, for we 
met Captain Orme and Sir John St. Clair, 
and were soon in the camp. 

Here was our most western fort. It lay 
very well, what there was of it finished, 
just where Wills Creek falls into the Po- 
tomac. 

I went, with Captain Orme guiding me, 
to headquarters at the fort to report, pass- 
ing a few Indians and squads of ill-clad Vir- 
ginians whom an officer, one Ensign Allen, 
was cursing and trying to drill into reg- 
ulars. 

Everybody was out of temper for one 
reason or another. Sir John could get 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 223 

neither waggons nor flour, and the Indian 
squaws were making mischief because of the 
unchecked license of the younger officers. 

Having reported, I was received very 
agreeably b}^ the general and his aides, and 
he would have me to dine with him that 
day. At four in the afternoon— for the 
general kept very fashionable hours— we 
sat down in a great room in the fort, and 
as he told us his cooks could make a good 
ragout out of old boots, we were served 
with a great variety of dishes, and in fine 
state. 

The general had Lord Fairfax on his 
right and Mr. Franklin on his left, and I 
was fortunate to find myself beside a very 
courteous gentleman just come to the fort, 
Mr. Richard Peters, secretary of Governor 
Morris of Pennsylvania. I engaged this 
gentleman in talk concerning the propri- 
etary government and the Quakers, and 
their unwillingness to be taxed for defence, 
until, the wine being freely used and then 
punch more than enough, men's tongues 
were loosed. There were toasts to the King 
and the governor, and at last I heard the 
general's voice raised. 

He said: "Your health, Mr. Peters, and 



224 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

when do you set out to cut that road for my 
troops? You are long about it." Mr. 
Peters said quietly: *'When, sir, I get 
guards against the Indians for the wood- 
cutters; until then it will not be possible." 

The general damned Pennsylvania and 
the Quakers, and said: "That colony must 
find guards for their own wood-cutters, and 
as to the Indians, his Majesty's regulars 
laugh at the idea of danger from them." 
Upon which, several officers, not very sober, 
cried out, ' ' Hear, hear ! ' ' 

Mr. Peters, who had taken very little 
wine, replied that they were not to be de- 
spised, meaning the savages, but that every 
step of the march would be at risk of ambus- 
cades. 

Then, to my amazement. General Brad- 
dock cried out that he despised such coun- 
sels and that the colonials were like old 
women. 

On this Mr. Peters rose, and one or two 
other gentlemen, and I saw Mr. Franklin 
glance at him. As he hesitated, I said so 
that he alone could hear : ' ' Pardon me, Mr. 
Peters, the man is drunk, and you are en- 
tirel}^ right." Then I saw that his lord- 
ship spoke quickly to the general, who cried 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 225 

out: ''My apologies, Mr. Peters, and a 
glass with you. We have had too many 
vinous counsellors. You shall have your 
guards"— as indeed he did, but not until 
my lord had been very urgent, and also Mr. 
Franklin. Mr. Peters, very grave, bowed 
and sat down. When shortly his lordship 
went away, I made my own excuses and fol- 
lowed him. 

The next day I happened to be in his lord- 
ship 's quarters and Mr. Franklin present, 
when General Braddoek called to pay his 
respects to Lord Fairfax. We rose to go 
out, but his lordship detained us. The gen- 
eral was in high spirits. He said to Mr. 
Franklin : ' ' Only let the colonies keep their 
promise and all will be well." 

I confess I was unprepared for the con- 
fidence with which he assured Mr. Franklin 
that he would take Duquesne and go on 
to Niagara and Frontenac, and that the fort 
would be an affair of a day or two. 

"But, sir," said Mr. Franklin, ''you must 
march through a narrow road in pathless, 
dense forests, and your line will be some 
four miles long. You will, I hope, take 
Duquesne, but you will be, I fear, in con- 
stant danger of being cut in two, for the 



226 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

French and Indians are dexterous in am- 
buscades, and to send back relief quickly, 
if attacked, will be nigh to impossible with 
woods all about you. As to the waggons 
we talked of, I will get you all the waggons 
3^ou want out of Pennsylvania, and shall set 
out for Lancaster at once." 

The general thanked him, but said he 
must remind Mr. Franklin that he talked 
as a civilian, and that, although these sav- 
ages might be formidable to raw American 
militia, they would make no impression on 
disciplined troops, and much more to like 
effect. 

Mr. Franklin replied quietly : ' ' I am con- 
scious, sir, of the impropriety of arguing 
such matters with a military man, but I 
should like to ask Colonel Washington his 
opinion. He has had some experience in 
the irregular warfare of our woods," 

His lordship, desirous, as I learned later, 
that I should not contradict my superiour, 
said : ''I beg to answer for Mr. Washington 
that I am sure General Braddock will, as 
time serves, consult such colonial officers as 
have seen service on the frontier." 

After other talk the general rose, and 
said he should be sure to take his lordship's 
advice. 



XXXIII 

WHEN alone with us the Postmaster- 
General talked with even greater 
seriousness, saying that in Philadelphia, so 
secure were they of the success of the cam- 
paign, that a gentleman, a Dr. Bond I think 
it was, proposed to raise money for an illu- 
mination to be ready when the news of vic- 
tory came. Mr. Franklin told us that he had 
begged him to take warning from a verse 
in the Old Testament as to before battle and 
after, and this much pleased his lordship, 
who laughed and said, "Well put, sir",- 
but when I asked what the verse was, they 
both laughed and bade me read my Bible, 
and, indeed, I am none the wiser up to this 
day. 

It was not alone the general who was dis- 
contented. On arriving at Wills Creek I 
found this letter from George Croghan, one 
of the most important traders on the fron- 
tier, and with a commission from Penn- 

227 



228 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

sylvaiiia to make roads and secure waggons 
and Indian allies. 



Dear Colonel: If the rest are like Sir John 
St. Clair, I shall be glad to be shut of the busi- 
ness. He swore at us for delay and said "no 
soldier should handle an axe, but by fire and 
sword he would force the inhabitants to do the 
work ; we should be treated as traitors, and that 
when the General came he would give us ten bad 
words for one that he had given." You, Sir, 
know well how hard it is to stir up our border 
folks and what a task to get from farmers in the 
spring their waggons and horses. We are doing 
our best. I have secured Captain Jack— a guide 
hard to beat. 

There was more of it, and enough to af- 
ford serious thought. 

During our stay I heard nothing but com- 
j)laints of our want of efificieney, and no 
one seemed to see that it was silly to expect 
to find everything at hand in a land as 
new as ours. Captain Orme and Ensign 
Allen complained on one occasion to Dr. 
Mercer and me that our men were languid, 
spiritless, and unsoldier-like. Dr. Mercer, 
who was a hot-headed Scotchman, said he 
had seen undisciplined Highlanders put to 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 229 

rout regulars at Prestonpans and Falkirk, 
and that in the woods our men would beat 
the best grenadiers in the King's army. 
Orme grew angry and said Mercer was a 
damned rebel; but I succeeded in quieting 
them, although I insisted that Captain Orme 
would in time change his opinion, as indeed 
happened. Mercer was in a constant rage 
and told me over and over that the officers 
were insolent and that the general was ill 
with the disease called damned foolishness. 
I thought him imprudent and begged him 
to be careful; but as he had served in '45 
with the Pretender, and come over here 
after his flight, he was, on that account, in 
bad odour with the regular officers, and, I 
feared, also with the general, who had been 
with the Duke of Cumberland upon the final 
bloody defeat of the rebels at Culloden. Dr. 
Mercer had just cause to complain, but I 
thought him unwise to talk so freely. He 
was, nevertheless, a gallant gentleman, and 
died a general, falling gloriously at Prince- 
ton when rallying his men. 

I saw Mr, Franklin again but once before 
he went away. He was clearly not a man al- 
together to the liking of Lord Fairfax, but 
why, I never came to know. He seemed to 



230 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

me at that time a conscientious and intelli- 
gent person, very able to get along with all 
manner of people. I must admit that he 
conducted matters of gravity as if they 
amused him and were not serious, a method 
which never altogether pleased me. When 
I justified the general's groaning over his 
many difficulties as to roads and transport 
and food, he said that his difficulties were 
of British making, and that had the force 
landed in Philadelphia, horses, waggons, 
and supplies would have been found in 
abundance. To this I agreed, for I thought 
the plan of the march ill chosen. After this 
the doctor amused himself with the aston- 
ishment the Indians would have when they 
got hold of the wigs of the officers— a jest 
which did not seem to me agreeable. He 
spoke also with much freedom of the gen- 
eral, and said to argue with him was useless 
and was like striking a pillow or reasoning 
with a wild animal, who had only its own 
thoughts and could not comprehend yours. 
I made no reply, and he fell to most in- 
genious talk about the temperature of 
springs and the ways of swimming. Not- 
withstanding his doubts, the great array of 
war kept me somewhat confident and cheer- 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 231 

ful until I heard that nine hundred men of 
the French had passed Sandusky on their 
way to reinforce the French on the Ohio, 
so that I had to write Mr. Speaker Robin- 
son that I feared we should have more to 
do than merely to march up and down the 
hills, as the general had said would be all. 

It was May 19 when the general arrived 
at Fort Cumberland, and June 10 before 
he set out to cross the mountains, and after, 
as the general said, more expenditure of 
oaths in a month than he had needed in his 
whole Scotch campaign with the duke, of 
whom the general liked to speak. 

I spent much of my time while we lay at 
this post in learning the methods of drill 
and discipline, and in aiding to satisfy the 
Virginia recruits that it was necessary to 
imitate the methods of the regulars, al- 
though if it came to wood fighting I believed 
the English officers and men would more 
need to learn the ways of the rangers. Yet 
some who judged our people by their dis- 
like of strict drill were of opinion that the 
lowness and ignorance of their officers gave 
little hope of their future behaviour under 
fire. My task of helping to train the men 
was given up when the general ordered me 



232 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

to go to Williamsburg and fetch back four 
thousand pounds, an errand not much to 
my liking. 

Unfortunately, the detail was made with- 
out my having the opportunity of choice, 
and proved very unfit, giving me much con- 
cern and anxiety. I do not know why there 
was delay in assembling this detail, but 
eight days passed after I got my order be- 
fore I was given the men. I believe they 
would not have been eight seconds in dis- 
persing if we had been attacked. 

Captain Horatio Gates, of a New York 
Independent company, advised not to take 
regulars, who would obey only their own 
officers ; but I had no choice, and so set out 
and was gone a fortnight. On my return 
I slept every night in the waggon, with my 
precious money about me and pistols loaded. 
The men were drunken and disobedient un- 
til I promised strappado on our reaching 
camp, and indeed I was glad to be rid of 
the money and the guard. 

I saw during this ride and later that, as 
Orme had told me, the men of the Forty- 
fourth and Forty-eighth regiments were 
drunken, mutinous, and disorderly, so that 
it was not alone our own failures to provide 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 233 

which made difficult the task of our unfor- 
tunate commander. 

I found the general much disgusted at 
the delays in supplying him, and, as I 
thought, most unwise, and only increased 
his trouble by abuse of the colonies, for the 
more men deserve abuse the less they like it, 
and get sullen and less than ever inclined to 
help. 

Just before we set out from Fort Cum- 
berland, the general being now in the sad- 
dle. Lord Fairfax presented me with a hand- 
some pair of pistols, and said: "I should 
have been pleased to have had a son like 
you; but for that I must have had a wife, 
which is a calamity I have been siDared. If 
occasion serves, I shall be glad to hear from 
you." 

Lord Fairfax had informed me that Gen- 
eral Braddock would ask my opinion and 
advice as to the use to be made of Indians 
and our rangers. He did consult me, but 
only, I believed, because his lordship had 
desired him to do so. 

I never succeeded to make much impres- 
sion upon him, and it was as the wise Mr, 
Franklin had said. Many Indians joined 
us on the way with their squaws, but the 



234 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

chiefs were too little considered or con- 
sulted. Their women were insulted or 
worse, and those that came to-day, receiv- 
ing no gifts, were gone to-morrow. 

On June 6, Sir John St. Clair was sent 
on in advance with some six hundred chop- 
pers to widen and better my old road. 
After him came Sir Peter Halket's force. 
On June 10, if I remember aright, the gen- 
eral followed with his staff and the rest of 
the army. As soon as the march began, the 
lack of discipline became plain, and the 
officers were worse than the men and alto- 
gether too much drunkenness. 

Captain Croghan said to me: "I should 
like to give these fellows a wood drill and 
upset half the rum-kegs." This was as we 
led our horses over the second mountain. 
''Why, sir," he said, "here are hundreds 
of waggons and enough gimcracks and non- 
sense to fit out a town, and all the officers of 
foot on horseback." 

I said that I had represented to the gen- 
eral and Colonel Dunbar the risk of this 
long train, and urged that we use our horses 
for packhorses and to carry only what we 
really needed. ' ' That would be, ' ' Captain 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 235 

Croglian said, ''for the men, blankets, an 
axe, a rifle, a knife, and ammunition." 

He went on to tell us that he had urged 
this to be done again and again— that was, 
to Captains Orme and Shirley, the military 
secretary of the commander, for he had been 
told plainly enough that he was himself too 
small a person to converse with the general, 
and a d— d trader he had been called. He 
was sure the general would listen to no ad- 
vice except from the King's officers. I had 
to admit that he listened to me at times, and 
had always said in a civil way that he would 
consider of what I advised, but got no fur- 
ther. 



XXXIV 

CEOGHAN came to me the day after at 
my hut (I am not sure of this date), 
and with him was Mr. Gist and a tall man 
in buckskins, leggins, and moccasins. He 
carried a long rifle and a scalping-knife. 

Captain Croghan said: ''This, colonel, is 
my friend, Captain Jack, of whom I wrote. 
He has come with fifty Pennsylvania men 
to offer as scouts." 

I had heard often of this man and was 
pleased that we were to have his services. 
I made him welcome, bade him be seated, 
and offered him rum, which he refused to 
take, saying he drank no spirits. He was 
very silent and made brief answers to my 
questions concerning the Indians and their 
inclinations. When I would have gone fur- 
ther, he rose and said his men were waiting 
to camp. He must see the general, and 
asked me to go with him. As we walked 
through the shelters the rangers had set up, 

236 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 237 

I saw many look at him with curiosity, 
which was not surprising, for he was not 
less than six feet three, but a gaunt, thin 
man, of melancholic aspect. He never spoke 
a word, but presently we met a certain 
Major Moore, a rough, hard-drinking of- 
ficer of the grenadiers. As he stopped us, 
I saw that he was under liquor, as was too 
common. He said, "Whom have you got 
there? Make a fine grenadier." I said, 
"This is Captain Jack, a famous Pennsyl- 
vania scout," and so would have passed on, 
when the major said rudely to Captain Jack, 
"Who the deuce made you a captain?" 
The scout tapped his rifle and said, " That, " 
and walked on, without saying more than 
his gesture seemed to imply. I could not 
avoid remarldng, "You are well answered, 
major," for I have always had a liking for 
men who do not talk much. I contented my- 
self with saying to the scout that, as usual, 
the major was in liquor. 

I sent in my name to General Braddock, 
and we were desired to enter his tent. Here 
I introduced Captain Jack as an experi- 
enced ranger and said he had fifty good 
scouts. The general asked me to be seated, 
but as he did not invite the scout to sit down, 



238 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

I remained standing. As for the captain, 
he said not so much as a word, but waited, 
looking steadily at the general, who asked 
me a question concerning the roads, and 
then said to me, *'Let the man wait; I will 
see about him in a day or two." Then he 
asked what pay they wanted, to which Cap- 
tain Jack said, *'No pay, nothing." 

I tried to make the general understand 
the great service we might expect in the 
woods from such men, but he replied im- 
patiently that these men could not be drilled, 
and that he had experienced troopers on 
whom he could rely for any service he 
might require. He was going on to give 
orders as to where the men should camp, 
when Captain Jack turned and went out 
without further words. The general 
damned him roundly for an ill-bred cur, and 
I made after him in haste. When I had 
overtaken him, he said very quietly : ' ' Good- 
by, Colonel Washington ; when you have a 
separate command send for me." I made 
a vain effort to induce him to remain. In 
half an hour he called his men together, and 
they went away into the woods Indian 
fashion, one after the other, and we saw 
him no more. Captain Croghan told me 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 239 

that this man had had his whole family 
massacred by the Indians, and had spent 
years in revenging himself, sometimes 
alone, and sometimes with a party, for he 
was both esteemed and trusted on the bor- 
der-lands of Pennsylvania. Both Croghan 
and I were much disappointed. 

Amid the difficulties caused by European 
need of useless luxuries and by the absence 
in officers and men of what Mr, Franklin 
called ''pliability in the hands of new cir- 
cumstances," I was getting useful lessons 
and was made to see that when a com- 
mander cannot get what he wants he must 
make the most of what little he has. In- 
deed, the delay in getting waggons he could 
have done without was, in the end, a calam- 
ity to the general. 

The army, over two thousand strong, fol- 
lowed routes over and through the Alle- 
ghanies which I had used in 1754, and which 
could easily have been bettered by free use 
of trained scouts and our own axe-men sent 
on ahead. 

There was much sickness, and the regu- 
lars suffered in many ways by reason of 
ignorance and want of knowing how bet- 
ter to take care of themselves. They com- 



240 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

plained bitterly of the mosquitos, black flies, 
and midges, and took so kindly to smudges 
that Orme said the smoke was like that the 
Israelites had, with less or no trouble. 
There was, indeed, some reasonable cause 
for complaint by men unused to the woods. 
We had twice the worst thunder and light- 
ning I ever saw. Trees were struck, but 
no man, nor ever is in the woods. Three 
men died of the bite of rattlesnakes, but few 
escaped the little forest bugs called ticks, 
which bore into the skin and leave sores 
and great itch for weeks. Our rangers un- 
dressed every night and picked off these 
pests. The soldiers were too lazy or did 
not know enough, and many were lamed 
or ulcered for want of such care. 

Even before we reached Little Meadows 
certain officers saw the danger of our thin 
line; more than four miles of it stretched 
out across streams and marshes in deep 
woods. Had the French been in force we 
had certainly been sooner ambushed. Even 
the men became uneasy as we entered the 
white-pine woods beyond Great Savage 
Mountain. Here the deep of the forest was 
like twilight, and the trees of great bigness. 
When the rangers told the soldiers that 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 241 

these dark woods were called the ''Shades 
of Death,"— but why I do not know,— they 
were more alarmed, and were glad about 
the 18th to be out of the forest and descend- 
ing the shaggy slopes of the Meadow Moun- 
tain to Little Meadows, where was more 
light and room to camp. 

It was a wonder to us frugal woodsmen 
how all this host, cumbered as it was, did at 
last get over the hills and reach the Little 
Meadows, this being about June 18. 

On the evening of our arrival the general 
desired me to remain after the other aides 
had received orders and gone away. He 
then opened his mind to me with great free- 
dom about the tardiness of the march and 
his desire to know what was my opinion 
concerning the matter in hand. When he 
had made an end of speaking, I said that he 
had more men than were needed, but that 
to push on in haste was desirable and to 
take only the light division, leaving the 
heavy troops and most of the baggage. 

I begged leave to add that Duquesne was 
as yet weakly garrisoned, and the long dry 
weather would keep the rivers low, and hard 
to navigate by reinforcements from Ve- 
nango and the lake, so that if we could dis- 



242 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

mount officers, take to paekhorses, and push 
on without encumbrance, we could be sure 
of an easy victory. 

A council of all the field-officers was 
called soon after I left the tent; but my 
rank not entitling me to be present, I was 
pleased to hear from Captain Orme that 
the general had stated my views and that 
a more rapid march was decided. I was 
much disappointed to learn that we were 
still to be overburdened with artillery and 
waggons, I gave up one of my horses for 
a packhorse and saw it no more. Out of two 
hundred and twelve horses allowed to of- 
ficers, only twelve were thus offered. Why 
the general did not order them taken I do 
not know. 

The force selected was in all about twelve 
hundred men and their artillery; but in 
place of pushing on with vigour, they must 
needs stop to bridge every brook and level 
every mole-hill. In four days we marched 
only twelve miles. 

St. Clair and Colonel Gage were sent on 
ahead to clear the way with four hundred 
men, and the general followed with eight 
hundred. We still moved so slowly that 
we were constantlv halted because of over- 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 243 

taking our i^ioneers. It was up liill and 
down, where cannon and waggons had to 
be lowered by ropes. There were deep 
morasses and constant scares from outlying 
parties of Indians. 



XXXV 

ON the 21st we entered the colony of 
Penn, and on the 30th June dropped 
down from the hills to Stewart's Crossing 
on the Youghiogheny. Here St. Clair, sent 
on in advance, had cleared the ground for 
a camp. 

We had been all of ten days in marching 
twenty-four miles. Day after day, as 
Croghan and I uneasily hung about the 
flanks and the rear, we saw the long line 
of red-coated, cumbered men, sweating in 
heavy uniforms, with waggons and cannon, 
slowly moving through the silent woods, so 
full, to our minds, of peril. 

I had been ill for some days, but at the 
Youghiogheny Eiver I fell worse of a sud- 
den with a fever and pain in the head. 
The general was most kind and at last or- 
dered me to remain, leaving me a guard 
and my dear Dr. Craik. Colonel Dunbar's 
division had been left behind, to his great 
indignation, and was to follow slowly with 

244 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 245 

the baggage-train. I was in tlie utmost 
gloom at my detention, being in a way re- 
sponsible for the new movement. The 
chance to be, by ill luck, laid up while a bat- 
tle might take place much disturbed me. I 
wrote my brother Jack I would not miss it 
for five hundred pounds. 

While I lay in bed most impatient, the 
detachment went on, and soon after I had 
this letter from Christopher Gist, who was 
acting as guide : 

Respected Sir : We are moving along as sol- 
emn as a box-turtle, one day two miles, which 
any smart turtle might compass. The pickets 
are doubled, and men sleep with their arms, for, 
good Lord! if a branch cracks they give an 
alarm, and if a poor devil strays there is a scalp 
gone, for every step of our march is watched. 
Still I am sure there are no big parties out, for 
I have been off in advance and been within half 
a mile of the fort, and came nigh to losing my 
hair, but with decent good fortune we have the 
place. I should be easier with a few hundred of 
our own people in the advance and on our skirts, 
but they are kept in the rear, the Lord knows 
why. 

Captain Onne also wrote to me of fre- 
quent night alarms, and of the general's 



246 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

confidence at being now but thirty miles 
from the fort. Here two days' halt was 
made to await fresh supplies from Dunbar. 

On July 4, being stronger, I started in 
the rear of a party of one hundred men 
just come up from Colonel Dunbar with 
provisions. I was set upon going with 
them, but was too weak to ride a horse and 
must needs use a waggon. As the road was 
much cut up, my bones were almost jolted 
through the small cover left on them. On 
the 8th I reached the camp, now but thirteen 
miles from Duquesne. 

My journey took me through the Great 
Meadows, near where was my little fight, 
and past the ruined palisadoes of Fort Ne- 
cessity. I saw them with great interest, 
and felt some sense of gratification that now 
I might pay up my score against those who 
had both humbled and insulted my King 
and myself. 

Once, as my waggon approached the rear- 
guard, we came upon a dozen or more strag- 
glers. Some had fallen out tired, and some 
were loitering to gather berries. I cried out 
to warn them of the danger they were in, 
and, in fact, about a quarter of an hour later 
they ran after us, crying, ' ' Indians ! ' ' They 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINaTON 247 

may have had cause, but all the strange 
noises of the woods alarmed them, and this 
time the rangers said it was a wildcat. 

The sound of distant martial music from 
the camps which we were come near to 
seemed to revive my mind, and I was able 
to cast off the feeling of gloom and con- 
verse with Captain Shirley, the military sec- 
retary, who had ridden back with an order. 
He said to me that we had been a month 
in marching less than a hundred miles. 
Captain Morris, who was with him, said it 
was true, but all was well that ended well, 
and we had the fort at our mercy and would 
attack next day. I advised my friends, as 
I had before done, that it would be well if 
the officers could be dressed in wood colours, 
like our scouts ; but Captain Shirley replied 
that the general would never allow of it, 
and, indeed, when next day I got rid of my 
fire-red coat and put on a fringed buckskin 
shirt, I was no little jeered at, and Colonel 
Gage made some comments, which, I trust, 
he came later to regret. I am of opinion 
that the absence of a gaudy red coat saved 
me from many balls and enabled me to be of 
use when the other aides were wounded. I 
was much of Mr. Franklin 's opinion that if 



248 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

fine feathers make fine birds, they also make 
them an easier j^rey for the fowler. 

Indeed, the learned Postmaster-General 
made himself very merry over the queues 
and the stiff stocks and the bright scarlet 
uniforms. He thought the officers only 
needed corsets, which I was told they did 
often use at home. 

When, in the afternoon, very tired and 
weak, I reached the tent made ready for me 
by the kindness of my brother aides, I lay 
down to rest, and, as Captain Morris was 
now on duty, I asked him to tell me what 
was to be our mode of approach to the fort. 
I was able easily to recall the general fea- 
tures of the countr}^ for the camj) was now 
set about twelve miles from Frazier's 
former trading-station, where I stopped on 
my return from my mission to the French. 
We lay some ten miles to the east of the 
Monongahela River, and, as was said, thir- 
teen from Duquesne as the crow flies. 

As I rested and we talked, came also Cap- 
tain Shirley and Captain Gates of the 
Twenty-eighth Regiment, with Stephens, 
Hamilton, and Stewart of the Virginians. 
Of all of them I was the only man not 
killed or wounded in the next dav's battle. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 249 

I may well entertain my brother August's 
belief that the conspicuous hand of Provi- 
dence was over me, and he must be worse 
than an infidel who lacks faith in it. 

No thought of to-morrow troubled our 
council of war, and we discussed with spirit 
what our superiours meant to do. I drew 
on a piece of birch bark a rude sketch of 
the country. The fort lay on a high bluff 
in the angle made by the Ohio and Monon- 
gahela rivers. We were, as I said, some 
ten miles to the east of the latter stream and 
on the same side as the fort. Between us 
and it lay the deep, rugged ravines of Turtle 
Creek and the brooks which run into it. 
The country beyond it was densely wooded 
and without any road. To cross the creek 
and cut a road to the fort would be the most 
direct way ; otherwise we must march to and 
cross the Monongahela, a fordable river, 
and afterwards move along bluffs three or 
four hundred feet high, and follow the 
stream for five miles. We should then de- 
scend to the water and arrive at a second 
ford ; having crossed it, we should be again 
on the same side as the fort. Then there 
would be before us a slope, and, some two 
miles distant, hid in the woods, the bastions 



250 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

of Duquesne. Having made clear to my fel- 
low aides the localities, we considered the 
two routes, with some differences of opinion 
in regard to which was the better, until they 
were called away, and I was left alone. 

Soon after came Sir John St. Clair, sent 
by the general with a kind message. I then 
learned that some effort had been made to 
cross Turtle Creek, but that it had been 
found impossible to get the artillery over 
and that the engineers pronounced it im- 
practicable. Upon this the general had 
given orders to change the route, so that we 
should follow the traders' horse-trail, on 
which we had made our road, and should 
march to the river. There we were to ford 
the stream as I have said, move on the far- 
ther bank some miles, and recross by the 
second ford to the east side again, where the 
lay of the land allowed, as was supposed, 
of an easy approach to the fort. 

I was still weak, but although I could 
have desired more rest, I walked at dusk 
through the great clearing made for the 
camp, to report myself at once to the gen- 
eral's headquarters. I had been sorry for 
his obstinacy and the rudeness he showed 
in laughing at our way of fighting, but I 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 251 

had been told by Sir Peter Halket that he 
had said that Mr. Franklin and Colonel 
Washington were the only trustworth}^ peo- 
ple he had met in the colonies. I thought 
this foolish as showing poor judgment; 
but he had been most kind to me, and now, 
in spite of all his blunders and our own 
failures to supply him promptly, which 
were with some justice to be complained of, 
we were, as it seemed, on the point of suc- 
cess. 

AVlien I presented myself, the general 
asked most pleasantly concerning my 
health, and if I was well enough to serve 
as aide. I assured him I was, but I was 
really at the time feeble enough. When I 
ventured to make him my compliments on 
the near prospect of success before him, he 
laughed and asked where had been the need 
for our rangers and the tribes of Indians, 
and then made me a very fine speech, which 
I must admit to having been pleased at. 
I ventured to ask leave to go on in the ad- 
vance with the Virginia wood-rangers, so 
as to secure the pioneers and road-makers 
from an ambuscade. He replied shortly: 
'^Oh, damn your half-drilled rangers! I 
shall keep them as a rear-guard." I rose 



252 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

and apologized, feeling that I had been too 
forward and had better have held my 
tongue. Indeed, I excused myself as well 
as I could, and upon this his face cleared, 
and he said : ' ' Colonel Gage is to have the 
advance, and what would he say to the best 
regiment of the King being protected by a 
mob of squatters and border farmers. No, 
sir; I desire you as my aide." I said no 
more, and returned to my tent. 

I have never found that the coming of 
decisive events kept me awake when I was 
myself the person who had the duty of de- 
cision; but this night, whether from great 
fatigue or not, for that does keep a man 
from sleep, or that I was still fevered, I 
lay awake long, unable to free my mind 
from anxious thoughts. 

I regretted that I had not asked Mr. 
Franklin why at night we heard so many 
sounds in the woods which are not heard 
by day. No doubt he would have found an 
explanation. Long after the camp was at 
rest I remained sleepless, hearing the quick 
waters of the creek and the noises of the 
wood, with the hoot-owl's cry and the chi]> 
munks gamboling over the canvas of my 
tent, and such stir of the camp as never 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 253 

quite ceased. The way we were to march 
troubled me and others, especially Sir Peter 
Halket, who had forebodings, concerning 
which Dr. Mercer had some superstitious 
ideas, such as my mother often had, but 
which I never entertained, or if as to any, 
it is in the way of dreams. 

I had reason for my fears, for the two 
fords we were to cross could be easily dis- 
puted by a small party. I concluded that 
to leave all baggage and artillery to come 
later by the fords, and to make a quick and 
direct march over the creek and along a 
ridge leading to the fort, would be the bet- 
ter way. 

Having settled my mind as to what I 
would have done had I been in command, I 
disposed myself for sleep, but with no good 
result until so late that I heard no reveille 
sounded, and was waked by my orderly. 



XXXVI 

I DO not pretend, even now, to be ac- 
quainted with all the reasons which in- 
fluenced the general; but having made up 
his mind, we broke camp on the 8th and 
marched southwest along a little stream the 
scouts called Long Run, and so about eight 
miles towards the river Monongahela, being 
thus at last two miles from the ford he 
meant to cross the next day. 

When, in the afternoon about six o'clock, 
I was released from duty, I walked through 
the camps with Sir Peter Halket. The men 
were cleaning their guns and brushing their 
clothes and soaping queues and pipe-clay- 
ing, all as if for parade and very needless. 
Sir Peter, a man of excellent parts and 
a good soldier, had expressed himself in the 
council as averse to the plan of march. 
When he asked after my health and if I 
had again regained my strength, I replied 
that I was fit for duty, but had been better 
if I had been able to sleej). He said with 

254 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 255 

gravity that many would sleep soundly to- 
morrow and that he was sure he himself 
would be killed. This seemed strange to me, 
and I could only reply that I did not think 
I should be killed, but that we might both 
be wrong; and yet both of us were right, 
for these matters are in the hands of the 
great Disposer of Events, and have never 
troubled me on going into battle. One of 
my aides in the Revolutionary War, Colonel 
Scammel, to whom I was much attached, 
did always believe he would be killed, as 
indeed happened, at last, to my sorrow, at 
Yorktown. 

Dr. Craik was with me that evening and 
found me chilled and full of aches ; but not- 
withstanding a potion he gave me, I slept ill 
again, and was aroused in the morning by 
my good doctor. He advised a glass of rum, 
for which I felt the better, and when I had 
eaten and was in the saddle I repaired to 
where was General Braddock, a short dis- 
tance from the shore. He was in a gay hu- 
mour and very kind, asking if I felt well 
and would drink with him to the King that 
evening in the French fort. I could do no 
more than reply that to do so would give 
me great pleasure. I was presently sent 



256 THE YOUTH OP WASHINGTON 

down to the shore with a message, and there 
saw Colonel Gage crossing the shallow ford 
to some open meadow-lands on the farther 
side. He was to secure the two fords by 
which the whole force following him was to 
cross and then recross, so as to be again 
on the same side of the river as Fort Du- 
quesne. After him, about four o'clock, 
came Sir John St. Clair, with carpenters 
—or, as we should say, axemen— and en- 
gineers, some three hundred in all. 

I lingered a few moments and saw the 
last of the advance, as they marched up 
from the farther bank of the river and their 
red coats disappeared into the forest be- 
yond the ford, which was, I thought, well 
chosen and shallow. 

Before I went back, Gist, the trader, and 
Captain Croghan came to speak to me. I 
remarked that we had done well to come 
so far without more trouble from the In- 
dians. Gist laughed and said: "They have 
never left us since we dropped you at the 
Youghiogheny. " Then Croghan cried out, 
"There they are," and there was a sound 
of musketry beyond the river. It proved 
to be a small body of savages, easily dis- 
persed by Gage. It being then about six 



THE YOUTH OP WASHINGTON 257 

o'clock A.M., the signal to fall in, which we 
call the "general," was beat, and the main 
body fell in with fresh cartridges. 

The officers were in full uniform, and so, 
with fixed bayonets and colours flying and 
the drums beating the Grenadier's March, 
they waded the stream. 

I sat in the saddle with the two aides, 
Captains Orme and Morris, and with the in- 
terest of a young soldier watched this fine 
body of men fall in with perfect discipline 
on the further side and disappear in their 
turn. This being the main body, the staff 
followed with the general, and I was sent 
back to hasten up the rangers, who had the 
rear. I found them about two hundred and 
thirty strong, moving slowly, most in hunt- 
ing-shirts and fur caps and moccasins. A 
part were thrown out far to right and left 
in the woods. Ensign Allen and an officer 
whose name I forget appeared to be in com- 
mand, and were vainly endeavouring to 
keep up some of the military order they had 
been teaching. I thought them wanting in 
sense and wished I had the rangers at the 
front. I gave my message and left them. 
Then I made haste to ride back to the ford, 
which was still held by a small guard. Here 



258 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

I waited, as I was ordered to do, to see the 
rear well over and into the woods. After 
crossing the ford I found that a rough road 
had been cleared by the French along the 
blutfs, and hurried through the woods be- 
side the moving column to report. 

It was noon before we got to the second 
ford, where, after much delay with the ar- 
tillery, we got over, I think a little after 
one o'clock, as fine a sight as ever I saw. 
HerC; before us, were some open meadows 
about a quarter-mile wide, and, twenty feet 
above, the ford, with a fair road leading 
upward over a little stream called Frazier's 
Run, and into the woods. Very quickly, 
the aides carrying messages at need, the 
men were got into marching orders. For 
a full quarter of a mile there were bottom- 
lands in two easy rises, and beyond these 
the ground rose more abrupt amid long 
grass, very dry, and thick bushes, great 
rocks, and trunks of fallen trees, which the 
garrison must have felled for fuel. 

Long afterwards I rode over this field 
and saw better the trap into which we fell. 
On both sides of the road, which was broad 
and much used, the ground rose, and here, 
where the wood was more dense, amid thick 



THE YOUTH OP WASHINGTON 259 

underwood, were ravines, some very deep 
and others only five or six feet. These gul- 
lies lay among great trees, pines and gum, 
and a tangle of grape-vines, brambles, and 
Indian plums. One long and deeper ravine 
was the bed of a little creek, and on the right 
of the road the ground rose quite steep. 
Further on, as I saw at the time, for the ad- 
vance was slow, I observed that the woods 
seemed to show a series of low hills, and 
beyond them a greater rise of land to the 
fort, which was hid some two miles away 
on the bluff, nor did we ever have sight of 
it. 

Meanwhile we of the main body, halting 
now and then, marched slowly up from the 
ford towards the deeper woods, watching 
the advance as it entered the forest, and 
quite ignorant of the ravines, or of an en- 
emy, so hid were they in the underbrush. 

The main body halted in the mid-space, 
where the battle was later engaged, so that 
we lay for the time just on the second bot- 
tom. By this time Colonel Gage was far 
in front with guides and engineers, engag- 
ing in the woods, and Sir John St. Clair, 
with his working-party of pioneers, axemen, 
and grenadiers, followed. All was very or- 



260 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

derly, with flanking-parties thrown out on 
both sides, but not, to my mind, far enough. 
Orme wrote me afterwards, when he had 
learned better, '^It was all as if for a fine 
review in St. James 's Park. ' ' 



XXXVII 

AT this time, as I said, I was with Gen- 
. eral Braddock on the upper bottom. I 
considered that between the narrow road, 
where the three hundred men of the advance 
were entering in the woods, and the ford, 
might have been about six hundred perches. 
I took out my watch and saw that it was ten 
minutes to two. As I turned to look for- 
ward, heavy firing broke out in the woods 
and among the rocks and bushes. I knew 
too well the Indian yells. I could see men 
falling and others dropping back. Orme 
rode forward to get some account for the 
general. In a few minutes he returned, 
badly wounded in the left arm. Sir John 
still advancing, the general ordered Colonel 
Burton, of the main van, forward with 
eight hundred men. There was now thick 
smoke about the advance on the edge of 
the deeper wood, and amid yells and cries 
the whole of what was left of the pioneers 
and their guard fell back out of the woods, 

261 



262 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

at first a few, and then many, and down 
the upper slope, somewhat disordering Sir 
John's supporting party. 

Sir Peter Halket was told to remain with 
four hundred men as a baggage-guard, and 
the general rode forward himself with Colo- 
nel Burton's eight hundred men, ordering 
a bayonet charge of a party up the hill on 
our right, whence came so hot a fire from 
unseen enemies that the officers were at once 
killed, and the men fell back at a run. 

For some time Sir John's force behaved 
with great courage and let the broken pio- 
neers pass through their lines, but could 
never be got to go farther, and stood stu- 
pidly firing into the wood. At last, as the 
officers fell, the advance became more 
broken and began to retreat slowly, but at 
last running, until they were mixed up with 
Colonel Burton's reinforcement. 

I never saw in my later warfare worse 
confusion nor a hotter fire, nor men better 
hid, for the savages and French lay in the 
ravines among the brush and picked off the 
mounted officers, or fired into the masses 
of men with no need to take accurate aim. 

It is my opinion that even then if the 
general had remained on the cleared ground 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 263 

below and there rallied the men, where was 
open space and on the sides little cover, the 
day might have been saved, as the small 
French and Indian force would never have 
left the woods. He, however, pushed on in 
person, urging an advance, and sent Cap- 
tain Morris to order up Sir Peter Halket 
and the rear-guard. We were now caught 
on both sides among ravines, great rocks, 
and trees, where on our front and on both 
flanks the enemy spread out in the woods. 
The more of our force came up from the 
rear, the easier was the slaughter. For a 
time I was with the general and implored 
him to order the men into the woods. 
Wliether he heard me or not, I cannot say. 
What with our regulars shooting at random, 
the replies from the ravines and woods, the 
orders of officers, the yells of the Indians, 
and the cries of the wounded, there was a 
confusedness fit to turn any man's head. 
When the men tried to take wood shelter, 
as was proper and reasonable, the general 
and their officers cursed them for cowards 
and struck them with the flat of their swords. 
The poor dogs tried to obey their leaders, 
and again and again formed into platoons, 
facing to left or right, making them only the 



264 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

easier to kill. I saw Captain Orme of 
the artillery fall dead as they rode up with 
the cannon, and the engineer, Captain 
Henry Gordon, dropped wounded, but got 
up and did, I believe, succeed to reach the 
ford. 

The men with the swivels stood to it well 
in giving some shots, and then gave way, 
most of them tumbling almost in heaps. 
Seeing this, I dismounted with two other 
officers, and made a man hold my horse, 
and aided to fire into the ravine on the 
right ; but the few men left who should have 
helped to serve the piece soon dropped, hurt 
or dead, and seeing I could no further assist, 
I mounted again and turned out of the 
broken ranks to meet the Virginia rangers, 
who were running up the slope and spread- 
ing out to right and left, taking shelter 
wherever was a tree or rock, all most gal- 
lant and well done. Although the turmoil 
was such as I cannot describe, there were 
many brave efforts to rally and to carry 
the high ground above our right. All this 
lasted fully an hour or more, for at times, 
discipline prevailing, orders were given to 
storm the flanking slopes, and constantly 
failed to be effectual, for, as the officers 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 265 

were picked off, the men ran back to the 
main body. 

The smoke was by this time so thick as 
somewhat to obscure all things at a distance, 
but a sudden wind, arising, cleared it away, 
and I saw that we were giving way more 
and more, the whole body of the force mov- 
ing slowly down the slope. As I looked about 
me in despair, my horse fell and rolled over 
dead. By good fortune I had learned in 
fox-hunting how to fall clear. In a moment 
I was UY), and saw that the troops were 
scattered in detachments and firing at ran- 
dom, or vainly trying in groups to follow 
their officers, who were shot down merci- 
lessly. I saw Captain Shirley, the general 's 
secretary, fall dead. He was quite close 
to me, and amidst all this tumult his horse 
stood still, and, to my amazement, began to 
eat the grass. I caught the beast and 
mounted. I hardly knew what to do. The 
Virginians were being shot by the regulars, 
who knew no more than to fire wherever 
they saw smoke from behind a tree or bush. 
As to orders, there were at this time none, 
and, indeed, until just above the river, no 
sufficient space to move in without taking to 
the woods. 



266 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

I tried to help the general and the few 
left of the officers in their efforts to effect 
an orderly retreat. I have heard that five 
horses were shot under him. This I was told 
by Captain Morris, and it is no doubt true, 
for the horse is a large object and easy 
to hit. Few officers were left alive, and 
those who were unhurt could not get the 
regulars to obey a command. A¥liat was left 
of twelve hundred men were huddled to- 
gether in groups in and out of the woods, 
as I have seen sheep in a storm. 

The general showed great courage, and 
made many efforts in person to rally the 
men or get them to retreat in an orderly 
way. He was carried down the slope with 
the rout, but remained as obstinate as ever 
as to the way of fighting, insisting on the 
men re-forming. Sir Peter Halket, Morris, 
and I vainly entreated him to order the 
soldiers to take shelter as the rangers did. 
As Sir Peter spoke, he dropped dead. His 
son, the captain, dismounted to help him, 
and fell dead on his father's body. 

I have never seen a man who could de- 
scribe what took place in the midst of a 
battle, nor can I pretend to greater accuracy. 
I remember that after an hour or more I 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 267 

became suddenly sure that all was lost. The 
whole disordered mass now broke and ran 
as sheep before hounds, leaving artillery, 
provisions, baggage, and the wounded and 
dying— in short, everything. When finally 
a dozen gallant officers threw themselves in 
front, they were knocked down and tram- 
pled on. We had as little success as if we 
had attempted to stop the wild bears of the 
mountains, or torrents, with our feet. It 
was quite useless. 

At this time General Braddock was under 
a great oak near to where we left the wag- 
gons. I was beside him and heard him cry 
out, "They have got me." Captain Stew- 
art, of the Virginia light guard, caught him 
as he reeled in the saddle, shot through the 
right arm and lung. The men ran past us, 
refusing to help ; but another officer aiding 
us, he was somehow got on to a tumbrel and 
was carried along in what was now a mad 
flight to get to the ford. I heard him cry 
out : ' ' Let me alone. Let me die here. ' ' 

The waggoners in our rear near the ford 
cut loose the traces and mounted their 
horses and fled. In spite of the great cour- 
age shown by the officers, who in camp were 
drunken or seemed to be effeminate or 



268 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

lazy, all who were of mind to resist were 
swept away by a mere mob of panic-struck 
men. Men caught on to my stirrups, and 
even the horse's mane, but somehow I got 
free and out again to one side. Instantly 
my second horse staggered and went down. 
I saw Dr. Craik, near by, with the utmost 
devotion, although himself wounded, help- 
ing a disabled officer to walk away. I was 
now afoot, and, as I saw how complete was 
the rout, I began to fear that our brave Vir- 
ginians would none of them escape. They 
held the fringe of the woods with wonder- 
ful courage, using their rifles, and keeping 
back the French and Indians. Nothing else 
saved the troops of his Majesty from com- 
plete massacre. 

As I stood still a moment I heard Cro- 
ghan call loudly to me to take to cover. I 
took his advice, and God alone knows how 
I escaped death. I had four balls through 
my clothes. 

The leaders of the rangers now saw how 
great was their j^eril. The regulars were 
by this time near the ford, in the river, or 
across it, A few brave men in groups were 
retreating slowly, firing useless shots. The 
enemy, yelling in triumph, were crawling 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 269 

or leaping nearer from time to time. Now 
and then a painted savage ran out from 
cover and fled back, shaking a bloody scalp. 

The rangers had lost heavily, but those 
who were left slipped from one shelter to 
another, and at last, when there was little 
cover left, ran down to the river, and I with 
them. Few would have got away except 
for the desire of the Indians to plunder the 
dead and the baggage and to collect scalps, 
and that the French were too few in num- 
ber to venture on pursuit. 

I got over the ford in haste, and stand- 
ing still on the rise of ground beyond the 
river, looked at my watch. I could hardly 
believe it to be, as I saw, five o 'clock. Most 
of those who were unhurt were now safe, 
and with Captain Croghan I began to gather 
the wreck of our poor rangers. One com- 
pany was almost all gone; another lost 
every officer and many men. As to the reg- 
ulars, seven hundred, nearly half of the 
force, were dead or wounded. A part of 
what was left of this fine army was soon 
scattered beyond the two fords, and later 
was starved in the woods or got at last into 
the camps. 

About a hundred men were gathered by 



270 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

the officers a quarter of a mile beyond our 
first ford. There Lieutenant-Colonel Bur- 
ton rallied some hundreds of men, and later 
about eightj^, under Colonel Gage, joined 
them. To my relief, and greatly to my sur- 
prise, there was no pursuit. 



XXXVIII 

THAT night the parties and sentinels 
thrown out deserted in an hour. Al- 
though very weak, I sat up beside the gen- 
eral all night. Dr. Craik, who had cared for 
his wound in the lung, assured me that he 
would certainly die before dawn; but he 
lived longer than was expected. I never re- 
member having been more disturbed in 
mind than during that night. 

We all sat up, armed, in or about the 
rude shelter which held General Braddock, 
and talked in whispers sadly of the battle. 
Captain Montresor and also Captain Gor- 
don of the engineers, who gave the first 
alarm, and who was severely wounded, de- 
clared to me that so complete were the shel- 
ters that he never saw so much as a half- 
dozen of the enemy. We could only lament 
the fate of the wounded left on the field, 
for the French made later no return of pris- 
oners. Every moment I expected to hear 
the yells of the Indians. 

271 



272 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

At break of day we rigged a kind of litter 
and got away, being soon joined, to my re- 
lief, by Colonel Gage and his eighty men. I 
caught here a stray waggon-horse and rode 
him, with a rope bridle and no saddle but 
a blanket. 

As we pushed on through the woods, Col- 
onel Gage talked with me at length of the 
disaster. He made many excuses for the 
soldiers, as that they had been worn out by 
labour on the way, had no rum, and were 
disheartened by the tales our rangers had 
told them of the Indians. 

Indeed, I fear it was true that the Vir- 
ginians amused themselves with talk about 
legions of rattlesnakes, bears, and scalping. 
Croghan said the regulars were babes in 
the woods and quite as helpless. I made 
answer to the colonel that but for our rang- 
ers few of his Majesty's men would have 
seen their homes, and that the soldiers had 
behaved like poltroons. He said that was 
true, and after this we walked our horses 
on through the woods in silence, the rangers 
ahead. 

I met this officer again in 1773, when, 
being a general, he was entertained at din- 
ner by the citizens of New York. At this 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 273 

time the freedom of the city of New York 
was presented to him in a gold box having 
on it the arms of that city, and below, those 
of the King.^ Our final intercourse was by 
letter, when he was besieged in Boston and 
I felt it needful to remonstrate upon his 
treatment of prisoners. 

So many officers were wounded that, the 
day after the battle, although very weak, 
it fell to me, having at last been better 
horsed, to carry orders to the force we had 
left forty miles in our rear. 

With a half-dozen horse I rode on all 
night in a drizzle of rain, and so all the next 
day, very melancholy and ready to drop 
with fatigue. Indeed, I fell down as I dis- 
mounted when I rode in to Colonel Dun- 
bar's camjD, and was only revived by a little 
spirits and a good meal. The whole force 
we had left here had been scared by our 
runaway waggoners and were with difficulty 
kept from flying. 

The provisions and waggon needed for 
the general were made ready during the 
night, and at break of day, with two com- 
panies of grenadiers, I rode back again, 
hardly knowing if I should drop on the 

1 Now in the possession of Lord Rosebery.— Editor. 

18 



274 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

road. I met the general at Gist's cabin, 
some thirteen miles awaj. On our return 
we halted half a day at Dunbar's camp, and 
then hurried on with his force to Great 
Meadows, where we camped on the 13th of 
July. There were, as some of us believed, 
still men enough, if fitly handled, to return 
and surprise the French; but, as Gist said, 
these men were already defeated, and no 
one of those in command meant to try it 
again. Indeed, Dunbar intended for Phila- 
delphia and to wait there for reinforce- 
ments. Even Governor Dinwiddle would 
have had him make a new campaign; but 
they had all of them had, as Dr. Craik said, 
a big dose of Indian medicine, and a council 
decided with the colonel. The governor 
was much troubled when he heard of this 
decision, and, as he told me later, wrote to 
Lord Halifax that he would have now not 
only to guard the border, but to protect the 
counties from combinations of negro 
slaves, who had become, Governor Dinwid- 
dle declared, audacious since General Brad- 
dock's defeat, because the poor creatures be- 
lieved the French would give them their 
freedom. My wounded general's proud 
spirit gave way when he heard of Colonel 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 275 

Dunbar's intention. He lived four days 
after the battle, having been brought in 
much pain, and still more distress of mind, 
to the camp at Great Meadows. 

For the most part he was silent and only 
now and then let a groan. Dr. Craik told 
me that he cried out over and over : ' ' Who 
would have believed it possible?" Once 
he said to Captain Stewart : ' ' We shall know 
better next time; but what will the duke 
say? [That was his Grace of Cumberland.] 
What will he say?" On the morning of 
the 13th Dr. Craik said the general had 
made his will and desired to see me. When 
he was aware of my coming into his hut, 
he put out his left hand, saying, "That is 
the only hand which is left," for the ball 
had gone through his right arm. He was 
said to be a great wit, but that a man about 
to die should have spirit to use his dying 
breath in a jest much astonished me. 

He said: "I want you to take my horse 
and my man. Bishop. I have told St. 
Clair. ' ' Then he said : ' ' I should have taken 
your advice. Too late; too late." After 
this he closed his eyes, and again, after a 
little, opened them and said feebly: ''If I 
lived I should never wish to see a red coat 



276 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

again. My compliments to the governor." 
He spoke no more, only, ''How they will 
curse me!" and I went out. In fact, I was 
too weak to endure the deadly sorrow with 
which this brave man's miserable end af- 
flicted me, to whom he had been so kind a 
friend. 

I endeavoured to distract my mind by 
examining the remains of the fort I had here 
made. To my amazement, I saw, as I moved 
about, that there was little discipline, and I 
observed that where there is too much drill 
and mechanical order a defeat does away 
with it entirely. The colonials it was hard 
to instruct; but as every man was used to 
rely on himself at any minute, and not to 
look all the time for orders, they suffered 
less during disaster, and on a retreat knew 
how to care for themselves. Now the few 
that were left looked on with wonder at the 
stupid destruction of waggons, provisions, 
and even artillery. Many of the officers 
were disgusted, and protested against these 
disgraceful proceedings. 

But Colonel Dunbar meant to move on 
to Philadelphia, as he said, for winter quar- 
ters, and yet now it was only July, and he 
had men enough left to guard tlie frontier 
or to return and take the fort. 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 277 

I felt sick and worn out, and soon went 
to my shelter among the Virginians. I 
threw myself down and fell into a deep 
sleep, and indeed never stirred until Cap- 
tain Walter Stewart had to shake me to 
wake me up. I must have dreamed, for he 
told me I had called out "Indians" twice. 

When I was well awakened, he said : ' ' We 
are to move at once. Every frog that croaks 
and every screech-owl is an Indian for these 
whipped curs. The general died at twelve 
'clock. He is to be buried in the roadway, 
so that the red devils may not dig up his 
scalp. Colonel Dunbar asks that you will 
read the service. ' ' 

I thought the request strange until he re- 
minded me, as indeed I knew, that the chap- 
lain, Mr. Hamilton, who had behaved with 
good sense and courage in the action, was 
badly wounded, and that the colonel, who 
was the proper person for this sad business, 
was occupied in arranging for the march 
and in destroying what had been gathered 
at such great cost. 

It was just before break of day I went 
out after Stewart, feeling a kind of satis- 
faction that the coward in command was not 
to commit to the grave my poor general, 
whom, being dead, every one would abuse. 



XXXIX 

IF I had the pen of a good writer I should 
incline to describe what I saw. There 
were great fires burning, and all manner 
of baggage and stores thrown on them. The 
regulars were chopping up the artillery- 
waggons and casting ammunition into a 
creek. 

About a hundred yards away from mj 
hut, in the middle of the road, a deep grave 
was dug. A few officers and men were gath- 
ered about it, and on the ground lay the 
general's body, wrapt in a cloak, but no 
coffin. I looked about me, not knowing how 
to conduct the matter. Then an orderly 
handed me the chaplain's prayer-book, with 
a marker at the funeral service. 

As I was about to begin, Lieutenant-Colo- 
nel Burton came forward with a flag and 
laid it decently over the dead man. Then he 
placed on it his sword, and fell back, and all 
uncovered. After this I read slowly, for the 

278 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 279 

light was yet dim, the service of the church. 
This being over, the men lowered the body 
into the grave and filled it up with earth, 
and cast stones and bushes over it . No 
guard was ordered, and no volley fired, lest, 
as was said, it might be heard by the enemy, 
which aiDpeared to me foolish, for there was 
noise enough, and at any minute one hun- 
dred men in the woods would have routed 
the whole camp, 

Dunbar made haste to get away, and I was 
not less pleased to be out of an ill-contrived 
business. 

This affair was a serious blow to the be- 
lief in the colonies as to the high value of 
the King 's soldiers. It became like a prov- 
erb in Virginia to say a man "ran like a 
regular. ' ' 

Mr. Franklin said to me long afterwards 
that this disaster gave us the first suspicion 
that our exalted ideas of the powers of Brit- 
ish regular troops had not been well 
founded, and indeed I am assured that when 
Lord Percy's and Colonel Pitcairn's force 
was put to flight at Lexington the older 
farmers on our own frontiers, when they 
knew what had been done, were less amazed 
than the minute-men of Massachusetts. 



280 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

We reached Wills Creek on the 18th, as 
Morris said, the worst-beaten army that 
had not been in battle. Colonel Dunbar did 
not require my aid, and my general being 
dead, my service as a volunteer was at an 
end. 

The march to the settlements was most 
disgraceful— all in cowardly haste to get 
out of the wilderness. I am satisfied that 
no troops are so given to pillage as a re- 
treating army, and certainly none was ever 
worse conducted by the officers or more 
disorderly than Colonel Dunbar's force. 
The settlers and outlying farms near Fort 
Cumberland suffered much; men and 
women were misused, and chickens and cat- 
tle stolen. I heard afterwards that in their 
march through Pennsylvania Dunbar 's men 
plundered and insulted the farmers still 
worse, and were quite enough, Mr. Franklin 
said, to put us out of all j^atience with such 
defenders. 

I bade good-by to the aides of the general, 
and would have had Orme and Morris go 
home with me to be cared for by Mr. Craik, 
but they preferred to go on to Philadelphia. 
They were much dispirited, but had only 
warm praise for my Virginia rangers. I 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 281 

was in no better humour, and felt, as I rode 
away, that we were on the edge of an awful 
crisis for the border counties. The favour- 
able sentiments Sir John St. Clair and Colo- 
nel Burton were pleased to express respect- 
ing me could not but be pleasing; but the 
situation of our affairs was, to my mind, so 
serious as to put me into one of my melan- 
cholic moods and to make me feel, as I often 
did in the greater war, that, what with want 
of patriotism and lack of spirit, only that 
Providence in which I have always trusted 
could carry us through a great peril. As 
usual, a brisk ride jolted me into a more 
hopeful state of mind. 

I lay for a day at Winchester in a poor 
tavern, cared for by the general's man. 
Bishop. There, to my comfort, came Lord 
Fairfax, who had the kindness to bring with 
him a good horse, which I was the better 
]3leased to have because what became of 
the horse the general would have had me 
have I was never able to hear. His lordship 
insisted that I rest at Greenway Court until 
I was more fit to travel. I had here many 
letters; one said that I was given up for 
killed, and there was come a long story 
about my dying speech. My mother was in 



282 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

a sad worry about me, and when she re- 
ceived my letter contradicting my death, 
and that I had never composed any dying 
speech, she declared I was always making 
her anxious and had no right to distress her 
by doing things that gave her occasion to 
think I was dead. His lordship overcame 
my objections, and I remained with him 
at the court several days, well i3leased to be 
at rest. 

When alone with Lord Fairfax, he 
showed me the affection and concern which, 
like myself, he was averse to displaying in 
company. After I had been made to give 
him a full account of the march and the bat- 
tle, he said : * ' You will be wise to write and 
to say little of what took place, and to let 
others say what they will. The men who, 
having done something worthy of praise, 
do not incline to speak of it, are sure to be 
enough spoken of by others." 

This was much as in any case I inclined 
to do, so that until now I have nowhere 
related this matter at length, and, as to the 
diary kept on our march, the French had it, 
and I saved only two or three letters. 

What his lordship wrote of this disas- 
trous business and of me to his friends in 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 283 

London, I do not know, but I was soon 
aware that both in England and in the colo- 
nies I was more praised than I deserved 
to be. 

In 1758, a second British force, under 
Colonel Grant, was defeated in like man- 
ner as Braddock had been, but this was at 
the outworks of Fort Duquesne. In No- 
vember of that same year I served under 
General Forbes and saw once more this dis- 
astrous neighbourhood. The hillside where 
we suffered such disgraceful and needless 
defeat was a miserable sight, for there were 
here scattered bits of red uniform and the 
bones of men and horses bleached in the 
sun. 

At this time the garrison had fled, after 
succeeding in part to burn the fort, but no 
great damage done. I myself raised the 
flag of his Majesty over the ruins which 
had cost the lives of so many brave men. 

I lingered longer at Greenway Court than 
was needful to repair my broken health, 
for what his lordship had to say of men 
and of passing events I found instructive, 
and the counsels he gave to agree with my 
own disposition. 

I received here a letter from my mother, 



284 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

entreating me not to engage further in the 
military line, but giving no good reasons, 
so that I had to reply that she should more 
consider my honour and what duty I owed 
to my country than to grieve over what 
might not result in misfortune, or if it did, 
was to be accepted as better for me than to 
have failed to be worthy of the esteem of 
just men. When I spoke of this letter to 
Lord Fairfax, he said I had answered with 
entire propriety. 

I reached Mount Vernon, as my diary 
shows, on July 26, at 4 p.m., a poorer man 
for my campaigning, and, I feared, with a 
good constitution much impaired. 

Soon after I returned I received several 
letters congratulating me on my escape un- 
hurt, and expressing a general satisfaction 
that amidst so much cowardice and ill man- 
agement the rangers behaved with spirit and 
courage. 

Among these communications one which 
afforded me more than ordinary pleasure 
was from Mr. Benjamin Franklin. Besides 
what he found fit to say of me, were certain 
reflections which, at this distant day, seem 
to nourish my inclination to look forward 
now, as he did then, desirous, as all must 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINQTON 285 

be, to discern from the present what the 
future alone can surely disclose. 

Indeed, as I have descended the vale of 
life I have had increasing need to consider 
what the years would bring about, for to 
endeavour to forecast the future is one of 
the duties of a statesman. 

Mr. Franklin, when in his last illness, said 
to General Knox, who spoke of it to Mrs. 
Washington, that I possessed the capacity 
to look forward in a way which, he said, 
was one of the forms of imagination, but 
that I had not the gift of fancy. I am not 
assured even now that I fully understand 
what he desired to convey by this statement. 

The letter which gave rise in my mind to 
these reflections contains one of those light 
statements which I have never found myself 
able to employ, and which do not assist me 
to understand the affair in hand, or to com- 
prehend any better what is desired to be 
conveyed. 

Philadelphia. 
To Colonel George Washington. 

Respected Sir: I am the richer for having 
had the opportunity of making your acquain- 
tance, and I ought not to conceal from you the 
pleasure I have had in learning of late that your 



286 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

conduct in the humiliating defeat of General 
Braddock was such as to be a matter of just 
pride to the colonies. 

Affairs with us, and indeed with all the colo- 
nies, are in a condition greatly to be deplored. 
We are, as it appears to me, much in the same 
state as a man I knew who, having married four 
times, had as a consequence four mothers-in-law, 
all of whom were of opinion that they had the 
right to meddle in his family affairs. These are, 
for us, the King, the Parliament, the Lords of 
Trade, and the Governors. For all of them we 
are a family of bad little boys. We, on the other 
hand, entertain the belief that we are grown-up 
Englishmen, who believe that we inherit certain 
rights. Soon or late mischief will come of it. 
The eggs of trouble are slow to hatch, but they 
do surely hatch soon or late and are never 
addled. 

It would be worse than folly to conceal from 
you my fears as to the future. There are limi- 
tations to what men like our colonists, accus- 
tomed to a large measure of individual freedom, 
will endure. We seem to me to have gone back 
a century and to be at the commencement of just 
such a struggle with the crown as then occurred. 

I was interested in what you said of the great 
coldness of a spring at Mount Vernon, I will, 
when opportunity serves, send you a good ther- 
mometer, when I think you will find that your 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 287 

wells have near about what is the average heat 
of the air for the entire year. 

I hope to hear from you at your convenience, 
and, believe me, I shall feel myself honoured by 
any such mark of your attention, and that I am, 
with respect, 

Your ob'd't humble servant, 

Benjamin Franklin. 

P. S. I venture to enclose one of my almanacs, 

B. F. 

I gave this almanac and the letter to be 
read to my Lord Fairfax. He returned 
them, saying that what was said of the way 
of governing the colonies was true, but that 
Mr. Franklin overstated what was to be 
feared in the future ; and as to the almanac, 
damn the man 's little maxims ! They smelt 
of New England. 



XL 



THIS account of my youth I have for 
the present put aside to be considered 
later, whether to destroy it or not. 

I discover in writing these remembrances 
that I have found pleasure in recalling 
many small circumstances which I had for- 
got. I also observe that, as I have written 
verj^ little but letters in my life, the habit 
of writing as if for another's eyes than my 
own has prevailed, without intention on my 
part; but this can do no harm, seeing that 
all this has been set down only in order that 
I may for my own satisfaction consider as 
an old man what judgment I should pass on 
my acts as a young one. 

As I shall retain for a season what I have 
written, I desire that, in case of accident 
to me, these pages should not for a long time 
be allowed to come to the general eye. The 
letters left among these leaves I intend to 
restore to their proper files. 

288 



THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 289 

DIARY — DECEMBER 7, 1799 

Rainy morning ; mercury at 37. Afternoon 
clear and pleasant. Dined with Lord Fair- 
fax at Belvoir. 

In the evening felt somewhat a lowness of 
mind, and am reminded, as I write, that I 
have never had the inclination to set down 
in my diary other than practical matters. 
To distract my thoughts, I began to run 
over what was wrote last year and to con- 
sider of what has passed since I wrote, and 
of what must be done with what was writ- 
ten. My late brother Charles dying in Sep- 
tember, I am the only male left of the 
second marriage. We are no long-lived 
people, and when I shall be called to follow 
them is known only to the Giver of Life. 
When the summons comes, I shall endea- 
vour to obey it with a good grace. 

I have had much anxiety during the past 
two years concerning my country, and es- 
pecially as to the indignities inflicted on us 
by the French, and a certain relief not to be 
again called, at my age, into the field. I 
may have been too anxious, but a bystander 
sees more of the game than they who are 
playing, and I believe I have had cause to 



290 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON 

feel uneasy. But the Ship of State is afloat, 
or very nearly so, and, considering myself 
as a passenger only, I shall trust to Heaven 
and the mariners, whose duty it is to steer 
us into a safe port of peace and prosperity. 

[The general died on December four- 
teenth of this year, seventeen hundred and 
ninety-nine.] 



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